Kidnap and Murder in Yu Gi Oh world
by WinButler
Summary: Marik and his girlfriend return to Domino City to reunite with Yugi. But when she ends up dead, all fingers point at Marik.....Can the gang solve the mystery and return the kidnapped Tea safely?
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh or any of the characters in this story except Phoebe.

Author Notes: In this fic, the Yamis and Hikaris have separate bodies. "Ryou" is good Bakura, and "Bakura" is bad bakura.Also, it might be a lttle boring in the beginning, but I need to have a background before any murders can take place.

Kidnap and Murder, Chapter one - The party, part one

Yugi Moto was sitting in his living room watching pokemon. It was a bit childish, considering he was 16, but he preferred it to doing homework. Besides, there was certainly nothing else to do except help out in the game shop, and Yugi was too tired for that. Eventually he decided to phone his friend, Joey Wheeler. He had known Joey for a long time, and he couldn't imagine anyone better to cheer him up on a rainy Thursday afternoon. He went over to the phone, but as he was about to pick up the receiver, it rang. Yugi jumped about a mile in the air.

"I hate it when it does that….."

All the same, he picked it up.

"Hello?"

"Yugi, its me, Phoebe."

"Phoebe? Hey! I haven't heard from you for weeks. How are you?"

"I'm all right, Yug. Look, I just called to tell you that Marik and I are coming back to Domino."

"_What?_ You are?"

"Yeah, we're bored of Egypt now. Ok, I'm bored of Egypt now. We want a holiday."

"Well, Phoebe, this is great. When will you be here?"

"This Saturday."

"Really? You know, Saturday's my birthday."

"It is? Oh, good, I love a party."

"Well, we're having mine at this place called the Shadow Realm."

"What? Oh, very funny, Moto."

"I'm not kidding, it's a club my cousin runs. Guess who suggested the name?"

"Er, I don't think I have to guess. So, is everyone gonna be there?"

"Yep." Replied Yugi. "Tea, Joey, Tristan, Ryou, Duke, everyone. There'll be a lot of people from school there too. Sixty odd."

"Great. Yugi, I'll have to go, Marik is whining because he got bit by a mosquito. I swear, considering that boy has lived in Egypt all his life, he doesn't half complain about the most trivial things."

Phoebe sighed and hung up.

Yugi grinned. He and his friends had met Phoebe and Marik during Kaiba's Battle city tournament, and after they had gotten rid of Yami Marik, Marik's dark side, they had been a lot of fun to hang around with. In particular, Tea had become close to Phoebe, which had struck Yugi as a little odd, since they were so different. Tea was nice and sweet, and friendship was very important to her, whereas Phoebe was a little mean, and before Yugi, tea, Joey and Tristan, had had no friends.

Yugi was definitely excited to see them both, they hadn't met up since Phoebe and Marik had left for Egypt. Although they called often, everyone had been hoping they would come back to visit.

So, who should Yugi tell first? He mused on this for a moment, before he realised his friends had gone to the movies that day, but he hadn't been allowed. Grandpa didn't like him to see scary movies, and certainly didn't like him to lie about his age. None of them were 17 yet, but Yugi was the only one who could barely pass for 13. All the rest of his friends could get into R rated movies no problem.

He decided to go and wait for them outside the movie theater, which was only ten minutes walk from his house.

"Grandpa! I'm going out!" He yelled, just as he was going out the door. His grandfather suddenly appeared out of nowhere.

"Yugi? Where are you going? I hope your not thinking of going to see Rabid Hobo Killer, are you?"

"Of course not, gramps, why would I do that? I'm just going to meet my friends to tell them the good news."

"Good news?"

"Yeah, Marik and Phoebe are coming back this Saturday, isn't it great?"

"Aren't they the ones who tried to kill you and Joey?"

"Yeah, but they're over that."

Grandpa looked suspicious, but nodded.

"Ok, Yugi, make sure you're back before ten."

"I will be, Grandpa."

Yugi left. He approached the movie theater, and wondered how the movie was. He did sometimes wish Grandpa wasn't so strict, but he knew it was for a good reason. Yugi had enough to handle in his real life, he didn't need to be freaked out by a scary movie. When he arrived at the movie theater, his friends weren't there, but he only had to wait for 20 minutes or so. He then saw his five best friends exit. He smiled. He saw the blonde, blue eyed boy that was his best friend, Joey. He saw the pretty brunette girl, Tea. He saw Tristan, the pointy haired tough guy. He saw Duke, the cocky, good looking owner of a game shop across town. And he saw the scarily pale, innocent looking, white haired boy that was Ryou.

"Hi, guys!" he ran over to them.

"Yug! What are you doing here? I thought you weren't allowed to see movies with murderers, psychopaths, and hobos in them."

Yugi laughed.

"I'm not, Joey. I just came to tell you guys that we're going to have two extra people at my birthday party this Saturday."

Tea glanced at Yugi with a puzzled expression on her face.

"Is that what you came to tell us? Yugi, we're going to have about 60 people there on Saturday, I doubt two will make a difference."

Yugi looked half way between amused and irritated.

"You guys! They're not just _any _two people. It's Marik and Phoebe!"

Tea gasped. The boys looked stunned.

"Yugi, that's great! Are they just coming down for a holiday?"

"I think so. Well, they're not staying."

"Even so….So did you speak to them? How are they? Is Phoebe all right?

"Well, when I spoke to her on the phone, she seemed all right. A bit rude, but that's just her."

Tea laughed.

"Marik giving her a hard time, huh?"

"She said something about him getting bitten by a mosquito."

They looked bemused.

"Don't ask. Anyway, you guys, since they are coming back on Saturday, I sort of thought we could combine my party with a welcome back thing for them. Does that sound good?"

"It sure does, Yug, but you do know we are the only people who know them?"

Joey chipped in here.

"Not true. Serenity's coming down for the party, and so's Mai."

"Yeah, and don't forget Bakura." Added Ryou. "He's like Marik's partner in crime. I'm sure those two will have a lot of catching up to do."

"This party is gonna be awesome!"

END OF CHAPTER ONE.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh or any of the characters in this story apart from Phoebe.

Warnings: None in this chapter, but violence later on.

Kidnap and Murder chapter two – The Party, part two Saturday, 6:00pm 

Tea Gardner was in her room, getting ready for Yugi's party that night. She was in the middle of glittering her face, when she heard the phone ring.

"Hello?"

"Hi, Tea, it's me, Phoebe."

"Phoebs! Great to hear from you! Yugi, told us about you coming back, and it's really great."

"Er, yeah. Well, I just called to say that, well, we're here."

"You are?"

"Checked into the hotel an hour ago."

Tea was clearly excited. "Wow! So, when will we see you?"

"At the party, of course. So, Tea, what are you doing now? Wait, let me guess. Accesorizing!"

"How did you know?"

"Because I know, you, Tea, dear. Look, I'm gonna have to go, but it was nice talking to you."

"Go? Why, I thought we could catch up?"

"Sorry, Tea, but we can talk at the party. Besides, I've got a crisis on my hands, Marik's complaining that the hand towels aren't fluffy enough and he's threatening to send them to the Shadow Realm." She hung up.

Tea resumed glittering her face.

Meanwhile, across town, Joey Wheeler was meeting his sister, Serenity, at the train station. He was standing patiently at Station 4, when he saw a familiar spike of brown hair.

"Tristan! What are you doing here? Are those flowers? Thanks, man, but I prefer orchids."

"Joey! They're for Serenity!"

"Um, yeah, I assumed that."

"I just wanted to welcome her back into town with a friendly face."

Joey looked annoyed.

"What about me? I'm her brother, you punk!"

Tristan looked shame faced.

Suddenly a girl appeared off the train. She was wearing a pink shirt and blue shorts, and her green eyes were sparkling.

"Joey!" Serenity ran over towards her brother, and hugged him.

Tristan cut in here.

"Hey, Serenity, remember me?"

She looked round.

"How could I forget you, Tristan? Hey, are those flowers?"

"They're for you, Serenity."

"Oh, you are so sweet. So are you going to the party too?"

"Oh, yeah, everyone's gonna be there. You remember Mai Valentine, don't you?"

"Of course, she saved us from those mean Rare Hunters."

"Well, she'll be there, so you guys can catch up."

"Wow, so will everyone be there? What about the Pharaoh?"

Joey suppressed a giggle.

"On holiday."

Serenity said:

"Oh, well at least Yugi will be there."

"That's right."

Saturday, 8:00pm

"There! That's the last streamer!" said Yugi triumphantly.

"Congratulations, you're truly a man now, you can hang streamers." Laughed Yugi's cousin, Lyndsay.

"Shut up, Lynds, I'm short, I can't do much."

"You strong? Cos we've got a lot of cartons of orange juice and the crates weigh a ton."

"What, no alcohol?" said a voice from behind. Duke Devlin had arrived.

"Sorry, dice boy, but are you 21? No? No alcohol unless you're 21."

"What if you're 5000?" said another voice from behind. This voice was distinctly colder. They turned to see two boys, both quite similar in appearance, except one was taller, and a lot more mean looking.

Lyndsay almost laughed her head off.

"Honey, you could be 500 000, but I am _not _serving alcoholic drinks to a crazed tomb robber."

Bakura shrugged.

"I wont need to drink to have fun at this party." He strolled off. Ryou went slightly pink.

"Are we early, Yugi?"

"A bit. I just finished hanging the streamers."

"While I brought the crates in" chipped in Lyndsay.

Saturday, 8:30pm

Joey was waiting for Mai to arrive at the door, when Yugi came up to him to ask him how everything was going.

"Are you enjoying it so far, Joey?" asked Yugi anxiously.

"Well, Yug, to be fair, there are only about 20 people here so far, not including Mai, so…"

"So you're not enjoying yourself?" Yugi looked crestfallen.

"No, buddy, course I am, I just want Mai to get here so she can join in the fun."

"Well, Tea's here."

Tea had just entered the club. She bounded over to Yugi and Joey, and gave them both hugs.

"How's it going? Is the party good so far? What have I missed? Are Marik and Phoebe here yet?"

Yugi looked a little scared by Tea's slight over excitement.

"Well, nothing very exciting has happened yet, Tea, and Marik and Phoebe haven't arrived. Nor has Mai, but Serenity, Tristan and Duke are back there somewhere, doing God knows what."

"Well, is that it? Well, OK, now that I'm here, let the party start!" Tea ran over to the back of the club where Duke was standing with Tristan and Serenity. Joey and Yugi were left a little dumbfounded.

"She's….excited."

"Yeah. Hey, Yug, d'you know where Ryou is? I haven't seen him since I got here!"

"Actually, no, I haven't seen him since he arrived, which was half an hour ago, when we were just finished with the decorating."

"Huh."

END OF CHAPTER TWO.

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	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh or any of the characters in this story except for Phoebe Saturday, 8:40pm 

Joey and Yugi were standing at the bar now, waiting for Tea to get back with Tristan. She was vainly attempting to pry him away from Serenity, but so far, none of her attempts had worked. Suddenly they both appeared.

"Hi, you guys."

"Tea, Tristan. So have you two been having a good time?"

"Oh, yeah, I definitely am", said Tea. "Its great, so far."

Suddenly Tristan said,

"Hey, can we get some orange juice over here? It's really hot in here, and not everyone's even here yet."

Yugi smiled. "Sure thing, Tristan. Hey, Lynds! Can we get some juice cartons?"

Five minutes later Lyndsay returned with four juice boxes and a cookie.

"Hey, a cookie!" shouted Joey. "And I didn't even ask for this!"

Lyndsay smirked. "Well, you know, I have met you, Joey. I can tell when you're hungry."

"How?"

"Well, you are awake."

Joey laughed. But when he bit into his cookie the smile disappeared. "Yeuch! Man, this cookie is _nasty_! Lyndsay, dude, where did you get this thing?"

"Hey, what? Those cookies are imported, man. All the way from Britain, no less. They have great cookies. Only there, they call them "biscuits." Crazy country or what?"

Joey scowled and threw the cookie in the bin.

"Er, Lynds, I have a small complaint, too." Said Tristan.

"What?"

"Well, it's probably nothing, but is there a particular reason why it says YBR on the side of my juice box?"

"That I do know. It's the shipping code."

"Imported?"

"All the way from sunny Barbados."

Tristan snorted.

Saturday, 9:00pm 

"Yugi, this party is awesome!" Tea bounced over to Yugi, who was, by now, surrounded by a crowd of people from school.

"Thanks, Tea, it is pretty cool, isn't it?"

"Are you kidding? It rocks!"

Joey grinned.

"Since when do you use the word "rocks", Britney?"

"Shut up!" snapped Tea.

"He's right, you know," drawled a voice from behind. "No offence, Tea, but you're no mosher."

Tea turned to see a girl with pale skin and long black hair, dressed entirely in black, bar the loud pink lipgloss.

"Phoebe! Oh my God, I can't believe you're really here! How-when-since-HOW LONG HAVE YOU-"

"About two minutes ago. Don't worry, Tea, I haven't talked to anyone else yet."

The two girls hugged.

"Where's Marik?" enquired Yugi.

"Oh, off looking for Bakura. I swear to Ra, those two are gonna be inseparable when they get together."

Yugi rolled his eyes. "Oh, great, I bet at least three things are missing from this club by the end of the night."

Phoebe shook her head. "I wouldn't count on it, Yugi. I'm fairly certain my idiotic boyfriend would just slow Bakura down."

Yugi smiled. "Quite possible, though, you know, Marik is quite stealthy."

Phoebe shrugged. "I guess."

Joey and Yugi decided to go to get a few more cartons of orange juice from the bar, so Phoebe and Tea were left alone to talk.

"So, where is everyone?" asked Phoebe. "I'm sure there were more of you than this."

"Well, Ryou's over there with Yugi and Joey, Tristan's flirting with Serenity, over there, can you see? Oh dear, he just got smacked on the head by Mai. I'm fairly sure Duke is in the back with Yugi's cousin."

"Duke and that Lyndsay chick? Didn't see that one coming. I mean, she actually seems cool."

"And I think that's about it." Tea finished.

"What about that other guy? You know, really annoying rich kid, thinks he's all that, I kicked him in the shins once?"

"Kaiba? On vacation, I think."

"Okay. So, is that it?"

"Pretty much."

"So I guess you and I should catch up."

Tea nodded in agreement. "That sounds great, Phoebs. So, tell me _everything._ Egypt's fun, right? Do you ever visit the Pyramids? Do you guys live _underground?_ You know, like Marik used to? Wait, wait, let me start from the beginning. How is Marik? I mean, how are you and Marik?"

Phoebe looked uncomfortable.

"Well…."

"What? You and Marik are OK, aren't you?"

"To be honest with you, Tea, I don't know. We've been having fights. Big fights. I don't know why, but he's just sort of, begun to annoy me so much! It's just…the paranoia,

and the anger, and the irritating me, and the complaining…" She bit her lip. "Oh, God, the complaining…"

"But…but you two seemed so happy last time we saw you."

"I know, but stuff has just changed since Battle City. I just don't feel the same way about him now as I did back then."

Tea gasped. "Oh my God! Is there someone else?"

Phoebe looked shocked, but then her facial expression changed to defeated. "I swear, I don't know how you know these things, Tea."

"Don't feel badly, Phoebe, it's a gift. So who is it? Is it Yugi? Is it Joey? Oh my God! Is it-"

"Tea! Not here, all right! Look, see here…" Phoebe removed a notepad and pen from her bag and scribbled a name on to a piece of paper. She passed it to Tea, who unfolded it, looked at it, and nodded.

Meanwhile, Marik and Bakura slowly crept up behind Yugi. They approached him silently and stealthily, apart from Bakura having to hit Marik hard in the face because he wouldn't stop giggling. They cautiously approached, and then, very slowly, Bakura lifted his carton of orange juice, and poured it on Yugi's head.

"Aaaah! What was that!" Yugi screamed. He turned to see Marik and Bakura giggling maliciously.

"You two!" Yugi looked pretty annoyed. "Look, I just got cut quite badly, and your childish antics aren't making it any better."

"Sorry, Yugi." Said Marik. "We didn't know. Hey, actually, do you mind if I take a look? I've done a first aid course, you know." Yugi looked suspicious, but agreed.

"Sure. Hey, by the way, Marik, when were you going to come and say hello to me?"

"Sorry, Yugi, but we were having too much fun terrorizing the children in the street" said Marik, as he mopped up Yugi's wound with a cloth.

"Terrorizing children?"

"Well, if we can't rob tombs, and we can't send anyone to the shadow Realm, what do you propose we do?"

Yugi rolled his eyes. "You know, Marik, you can have as much fun with Bakura as you want. But from now on, I don't think I want to know about it."

Marik shrugged. "OK. If your sure." He finished cleaning Yugi's cut and went off to dispose of the cloth, leaving Yugi alone with his thoughts. That is, until Tea came along.

"Hey, Tea, what've you been up to?"

"Talking to Phoebe, then Joey."

"How is Phoebe? Because Marik doesn't really seem right, for some reason."

"Really? Because, you know, Phoebe's a bit weird, too, but I don't think I wanna go into too much detail."

"Oh? All right then."

"Where is everybody?"

"Marik's off somewhere, probably "terrorizing children" with Bakura – don't ask. And as for Joey, he's trying to beat Tristan off with a stick, he won't leave Serenity alone."

"No? I thought he'd have given up on that by now."

"Evidently not."

Yugi and Tea stood in an uncomfortable silence for a while. Tea suddenly thought of something.

"Hey, where's Ryou?"

END OF CHAPTER THREE

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	4. Chapter 4

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi oh 

Chapter four

Saturday, 10:30pm 

Duke Devlin was standing at the side of the stage talking to Serenity. She seemed mildly interested in what he had to say, which was primarily about his game shop, but, other than that, she was a little spaced.

"Serenity? Are you ok?"

"Oh, I'm fine. I was just wondering where Mai had got to, I havent seen her for a while."

"Oh, she's talking to your brother out back. I could get her for you if you want. Do you need to talk to her?"

"Actually, that would be good, if you wouldn't mind."

Duke vanished into the crowd. Serenity breathed a sigh of relief and rushed off to the Ladies. She hadnt really wanted to speak to Mai, she had just wanted an excuse to get rid of Duke.

As Duke rushed through the crowd of people, he felt something sharp on the back of his head.

"Ow! What the hell was that?" Someone had ripped out some of his hair. Who had done it? Duke would have looked round to see, but Serenity was more important, so he rushed off to find the exit.

Meanwhile, Tea came up to Phoebe and asked her if she wanted to get some air.

"Sure, it's boiling in here. You'd think they could turn the air con on, there must be about 70 odd people here."

They went outside. As they left, they saw Mai and Joey going back inside by one of the other exits.

"The bathrooms are out here, aren't they?" asked Tea.

"Don't ask me. Hey, actually, look, they _are_ over there." Phoebe pointed out the bathrooms.

"I hate bathrooms that are outside" muttered Tea. "But I'll take it." She went.

Meanwhile, back inside, Marik and Bakura decided they had had enough of making trouble, and decided to go outside for a breather.

"I'm going to send that awful girl to the Shadow Realm in a minute." Complained Marik. "It wouldn't kill her to get some air conditioning for her stupid club."

"Pathetic mortal" muttered Bakura.

Back outside, Phoebe was getting bored. Tea had been in the bathroom for a really long time. She thought she had heard the word "Serenity" so she assumed Tea had met Serenity in there and was gossiping with her. All of a sudden, Duke Devlin appeared.

"Hey, Phoebe."

"Whats up, Devlin?"

"Just looking for Mai. You havent seen her by any chance?"

"She went back inside with Joey about five minutes ago. Why?"

"Oh, Serenity's waiting inside. For me. Sent me to get her."

Phoebe raised an eyebrow.

"Oh really?"

"Yeah." He paused. "What?"

"Oh, nothing. Better go back inside, Devlin, you don't wanna keep Serenity waiting."

Duke left Phoebe alone. As he was making his way back inside, he saw Phoebe's insane boyfriend and the tomb robber coming outside. He also saw Serenity exiting the bathroom.

END OF CHAPTER FOUR


	5. Chapter 5

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh, etc.

Authors notes: this chapter might be a bit boring but it does get more exciting later, really.

Chapter five – The morning after.

Sunday, 11:00am 

Yugi woke up to what sounded like the clattering of cups and dishes. He wondered what was happening, and then looked round to see that he was still in Lyndsay's club. The back room, to be more precise, lying on the couch. Next to him was Joey, still snoring, and on the floor were Tristan and Duke. Ryou was nowhere to be seen, nor was Tea.

"What am I still doing here?" He murmured to himself, as he sat up quickly. Not a good move.

"Ow!" He cried, clasping his hands to his forehead. "What is that?"

"That, my friend, is what we call a hangover." Lyndsay had entered.

"What? But …..I didn't drink any alcohol last night! How could I be hungover?"

"Well, I _think_ – and I'm just wildly guessing here – but I think the hot crazy dudes spiked the orange juice with vodka."

Yugi looked disgusted. "Ugh, that would explain why it tasted so weird. God, trust them. I have a splitting headache!"

"Ah, the words of someone who's never been hungover before." Lyndsay looked at him, almost proudly.

"Of course I haven't, I'm only 16!"

"Right. Sorry, Yugi."

"Look, Lynds, you don't have to mention this to Grandpa. I don't want to make him regret letting us do this."

Lyndsay laughed. "Sure thing, Yugi."

Yugi was awake by himself for about another fifteen minutes. He didn't want to risk waking any of his friends, Tristan was probably having a nice dream about Serenity, Duke, Yugi thought, had probably had slightly more to drink than the others, and, well, everyone knew Joey wasn't exactly a morning person.

But, one by one, the three boys woke up, and Yugi was surprised to see Ryou emerging from the room next door.

"Ryou! Where were you, buddy?"

"Oh, next door. Joey snores, you know."

Yugi smiled weakly. "I do know."

Duke grumbled, "What the hell happened last night? Why are we all still here?"

Lyndsay cautiously explained. "You all got a _little_ tipsy last night after the orange juice got spiked, so I kept you here overnight. Do you guys not remember anything?"

"No." said Duke. "I remember most of it. Just the last hour or so is a bit fuzzy. I remember that I felt a bit ill at about midnight, when most people had gone."

Lyndsay nodded. "Good thing. I would have let you go, but y'know, just in case. I am a bartender, I've seen everything."

As Lyndsay strolled out, the boys tried to decide what to do with the rest of the day. They deliberated for a while, but eventually decided to go over to Joey's place and order in Pizza for lunch. His was the most ideal location to be slightly hungover, as his parents were away til Tuesday.

"Hey, you guys." Said Ryou. "You know, my wallet is at my house, so what if I meet you at Joey's in an hour?"

Joey groaned. "An _hour_? But Ryou, I'm hungry _now."_

"Well, come on, Joey, your place is twenty minutes away anyhow, it wont be that long."

Joey sighed.

The boys split up, and the four who were headed over to Joey's hopped into Duke's flashy car for the ride.

"So, are you parents really away until Tuesday?" asked Tristan.

"Yes. But Serenity's there, so I'm warning you two." He eyed Duke and Tristan. "Claws away."

They mumbled in acknowledgement, but Yugi had the feeling they weren't going to give in to Joey's demands as easily as that.

They got to Joey's house, and went into the living room. They discussed at length the party the night before.

"So, did you guys all have fun?" asked Yugi nervously. He didn't want to admit it, but he was worried about what even his closest friends thought of the party.

"Are you kidding It was great!" said Joey. "You have to do it again some time, Yug!"

Duke and Tristan nodded in agreement.

"And it was nice to see Phoebe and Marik again" put in Duke. "Especially Phoebe, she's cool." They all rolled their eyes. "I'm serious. I met up with her at about ten thrity, when tea was in the bathroom."

Yugi nodded. After half an hour of inconsequential chat, Ryou arrived, clutching his wallet.

"So, you guys, are we ready to order? I'm starving."

"Sure, Ryou, I'll get on the phone to the pizza place right now."

While Joey was calling, Yugi anxiously confirmed that ryou had also had fun at the party.

"Oh, I had a wonderful time, Yugi. I suppose I could have done without being soaked with orange juice."

Yugi giggled. "They did that to me, too. Don't worry, Ryou, your hair will be fine. Er, I'm sure."

Joey came off the phone. "Five pepperoni pizzas, large, on their way now."

Ryou and Yugi both looked shocked. "Five _large _pizzas? Between five people? Joey, I could barely eat one small pizza on my own."

Tristan and Joey both looked bemused by this, but Joey just shrugged. "Well, I can eat whatever's left over, no problem!"

Yugi rolled his eyes. "Is your stomach all you care about, Joey?"

"Aw, come on, Yug, you sound like Tea. Speakin of, where'd she get to last night?"

Duke chipped in here. "Saw her with Phoebe around half ten. I think they left together."

"What about Marik?"

"I guess they met up at the hotel later."

"Must have."

They waited for their pizza in silence, each mulling over the events of the previous night. Eventually Joey went into the kitchen to fetch a large choc chip cookie.

"Joey! We're about to have pizza!"

"Ah, Ryou, I'm hungry!"

All of a sudden, Yugi grabbed the cookie and smacked it down on the table. Everyone was silent. Duke murmured, "Wow, he's strict…."

"I'm sorry Joey, but I really think you should wait until after you've had your pizza to eat that cookie."

"I guess you're right, Yugi."

After ten minutes of waiting in silence (apart from Joey's stomach rumbling) the pizza finally arrived. They all got up and ran to the door. The pizza guy said, in a heavy New York accent,

"It comes to $34.50." Joey handed him the money, plus tip, and they all went back into the living room to eat the pizza. Joey opened the first pizza box, but rather than ravenously shoving it in his mouth, as they expected, he stared at it in a stony silence.

"What is it, Joey?"

"It's this, Yugi." Joey removed a piece of paper from the box, and the other four boys crowded round. On it were the words:

**Hello boys.**

**I don't mean to alarm you, but you're about to find your first corpse. **

**Just think of it as a souvenir of last night.**

END OF CHAPTER FIVE.

PLEASE REVIEW!


	6. Chapter 6

Disclaimer; I do not own yu gi oh.

Warnings: nothing particularly bad, but there is some blood in this chapter.

To reviewers: Thanks for reviewing and keep reading!

To Phil: he formed an alliance with the guy who pretended to be called Namu……

Chapter six – The first clue Sunday, 11:00am 

"Yugi…what does that mean?" Ryou sounded absolutely terrified. The five boys were sitting on Joey's couch, staring at the note, each considering what it might mean.

"Look, it's gotta be a joke. We _know_ it's a joke, you guys. Lets not freak out." Joey was, surprisingly, acting quite rationally.

"Well, what if its not? What if someone is really dead?" Ryou seemed to be getting more worked up every minute.

"It has to be. How could someone be dead? No one got killed at the party. We know that. It's a hoax, you guys. A joke. Granted, not a very funny one, but that's what it is." Tristan seemed to be trying to convince himself more than anyone.

Everyone was silent. For the next five minutes, they all sat thinking to themselves, each trying to reassure themselves that the note was, of _course, _a joke.

"So, you guys, was the person that this note came from at the party last night?" Joey asked.

"He must have been. Or she." Yugi seemed to be a little dazed, not really knowing what was going on. "Maybe….maybe we should check this out, you guys. I mean, what if it's not a joke…and there is a dead body at the club."

"Only one way to find out." Said Tristan.

The five set off for the club, all piling into Duke's car, and arriving at the Shadow Realm after fifteen minutes. The club was closed, but the five managed to get in through the back entrance, convincing the security guard that they knew the owner.

"We're closed!" shouted Lyndsay, as the gang headed into her office. "Oh, its you guys. What are you doing back here so soon?"

"Look, Lynds, we need to know if…if there's a dead body here, or if someone died yesterday. Here."

"What? Is this a joke? Not a good one, you guys."

"It's not a joke, Lyndsay, we really need to know." Said Ryou, panicked.

"All right, calm down. No, there's no dead bodies here."

Yugi looked at the others. "Well now we need to know if you saw or heard anything strange last night."

"I saw and heard LOTS of strange things last night."

"Can you be more specific? A fight or argument, maybe?"

Lyndsay thought. "Yeah. Yeah, don't you remember? Oh, I dunno, maybe you were in the bathroom. Or already drunk. Well, whatever. There was that crazy scene with loads of people getting weird and having a big blowout inside. About ten to eleven or something. I remember because someone called me back inside to try and control the thing. Pity, too, because I was having fun eavesdropping."

"Eavesdropping?"

"Yeah, the girl with the long black hair and her insane boyfriend, you know, the hottie with all the tattoos, they were having a spat outside. Something about her liking some other guy. I found it hilarious."

Ryou went even paler than normal. "Was…was anyone else there?"

"What? Uh..no. I don't think so. Wait. Wait. Yeah, your friend Tea was there. Didn't seem too happy. But, I don't blame her. She wants everyone to be friends, doesn't she?" Lyndsay laughed.

"Was there anyone else? Bakura, for example?" said Ryou, in a would-be casual voice.

"Who?"

"Er, he looks like me except meaner."

"Oh, that guy? No, I think he'd already left. Look, what is this all about? And don't you think you should get the cops involved if you think someone is dead?"

"No, its fine, Lyndsay."

"But someone _is _dead."

Yugi looked thoughtful. "We don't know."

Lyndsay shrugged and left the room. The boys were left there in silence.

"What are we gonna do now? Do we really think Marik is capable of killing his girlfriend?" Tristan paused. "That _is _what we're all thinking, right?"

"Yeah, Tristan, that is what we're thinking, but there's no way. He wouldn't. Even if she did like some other guy."

"Marik is insane, Yugi. Insane. And violent. Insanely violent."

"Ok, I get it, he is. But…but what if she killed him?"

"Yeah, Yugi. Right. She was a strong girl, but there's no way in hell she could have overpowered Marik. Especially with his Millenium Item."

"Look, guys" said Joey. "I still think that note was a joke, why are we all taking it so seriously?"

"I'm sorry, Joey, but we get that note, and then fifteen minutes later we find out that Marik and Phoebe had a huge fight?"

"Coincidence."

"Ok, well lets assume, it wasn't, what do we do next?"

"Well, it was, but if you guys are gonna freak, lets go to their hotel room and confirm what we already know, i.e., that they are both there and our suspicions are completely unfounded." Tristan agreed with Joey.

Yugi sniffed. "You always take his side."

For the second time that day, they all hopped into Duke's car and headed off, this time to Marik and Phoebe's hotel room. Each was praying that they wouldn't find anything that confirmed what they were _really _all thinking, which was that something bad had happened to Phoebe. After another twenty minutes of driving, they got to the Four Seasons of Domino City, and ran up to the hotel room. Tristan knocked cautiously on the door, and even though he had been so adamant that nothing was going on, his hand was shaking an awful lot.

"Marik? Phoebe? Are you two there?" Yugi's heart sank. He began to realise they weren't there.

"Well….they're obviously out."

"Where would they have gone?"

"I don't know!"

"Try again." Tristan rolled his eyes and knocked on the door. But once again, there was no answer. He tentatively put his hand on the door handle and pushed it down.

It was open.

They looked at each other with grave expressions.

"Are we going in?" asked Ryou.

"What planet are you on, Ryou, of course we're going in!" The five boys entered the hotel room, each walking in slowly, not wanting to see anything even remotely suspicious. Unfortunately, they were to have no such luck. The sight that met their eyes was not a pleasant one. There was a huge pool of blood on Marik and Phoebe's bed. And on the floor.

"What the….."

"Oh God!" cried Ryou. "Why?"

"Calm down, everybody," said Tristan.

"Calm down! Are you kidding?" screamed Joey. "Look at this! It's pretty obvious one of these two has been hurt pretty bad!"

Tristan, who was examining the scene, looked at the other four with a sad expression. "I'm afraid it's worse than that, you guys. There's no way one person could lose all this blood. Whoever it belongs to is…."

"Dead?" Yugi finished his sentence for him. Tristan nodded gravely. He then gasped. "Oh my good God!" He shouted. "What in the name of f…"

None of the boys completely understood. That is, until they turned around. Imprinted in what everyone could only assume was blood, on the back of the door, was the word BLOOD. And below it was the word YUGI.

END OF CHAPTER SIX.

Please read and review, everybody!


	7. Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu gi oh.

Warnings: Blood and that, but nothing really bad.

Chapter seven – The first clue, part two 

"Oh my…" Tristan was the first to recover. "What does that mean? Yugi? Any thoughts?"

"Um…no." Yugi looked very thoughtful, but unlike the rest of the boys, not scared. Suddenly an expression of mild comprehension appeared on his face. "He's giving us a clue."

"A clue? To what, exactly? Why would he do that? Or, er, she. Whatever."

"Well, maybe it's a clue as to where he is. And why he did whatever he did."

"_If _he did anything. We still don't know anything about this. We don't even know if this is real blood."

Tristan chimed in here. "Oh, it is. I've seen enough of it to know when it's real and when it's not."

"So what do we have to do about it?"

"Well," Tristan mused. "Maybe we have to test it!"

"Test it?"

"Yeah, to find out who it belongs to!" Tristan was beginning to look excited. He got out a swab from his pocket and look a sample of the blood from the door.

Duke looked amused. "You, er, always carry that about with you?"

Tristan looked at him. "Yes I do. My dad gave it to me. Speaking of which, I can get him to analyse this blood back at the lab, and he can tell us who it belongs to."

Yugi looked confused. "But doesn't she need to have a sample of her DNA in the system?"

Tristan thought about this for a minute. "Well, I accidentally scratched her last night. I suppose there'll be epithelials under my nails. If they match the blood, then…."

"Then Phoebe is dead." Finished Yugi.

Duke was shaking his head manically. "This is ridiculous. If you told me yesterday that this time today we'd be catching crazed killers and chasing dead girls then I'd have told you…" Duke couldn't finish.

Tristan managed to, just about, keep his head. "Look, it's probably nothing. Well, OK, no, it's probably something. But it might not even be blood."

"You said it definitely was."

"Well….yeah, but, I – I don't, um…."

He fell silent. He knew there wasn't much point in pretending like this situation was in any way good. "Look, everybody, we just have to keep very calm. If we panic, then that will just make it easier for our killer, if there is one, to get away with it."

"He's right," chimed in Ryou, much to everyone's surprise. "It's much better to face these kind of things with a sense of rationality."

"Don't forget poise." Laughed Yugi.

"What?" said Duke, confused.

"Don't worry," said Yugi. "Very bad Panic At The Disco reference."

Duke, Tristan, and Joey looked utterly bemused, but kept silent. "Hey!" said Duke suddenly. "You know what I've just realised? Tea was a witness to whatever happened last night between Marik and Phoebe! If we just call her, she can tell us what happened!"

"Good idea, Duke. Yugi got out his phone and began dialling Tea's cellphone number.

_The phone you have called is switched off. Please try again later._

"What? Since when does Tea ever switch her phone off?"

"Tea's phone's off? Well, maybe you could try her home number?" Yugi did so. But Tea's mother told them that Tea had not come home the previous night, and that she was staying with Phoebe.

"Great," muttered Joey. "Tea's AWOL, someone's dead, and, well, look at Ryou." Joey was right, Ryou did not look happy. He was even paler than normal, and he seemed to be shaking slightly.

"I'm all right, really I am guys. It's just a bit much." They all looked at him sympathetically. Ryou was sensitive and they knew that he couldn't be handling the idea that someone might be dead, or have been murdered, very well.

"Look, we gotta do something. We'll go back to the club and do some digging. You never know, we might find something, anything that might help." Joey was in favour of action. And for once, everyone agreed with him.

"Actually," said Tristan, "I might go right to the lab, I can probably get my dad to help me analyse this sample right away. That s, if he's not busy on a case. And if he is, well, I know the password to the lab."

"Good idea, Tristan, the sooner we know who that blood belongs to, the better."

The five boys once again jumped into Duke's car and set off for the club again. They hoped they wouldn't get any trouble from Lyndsay, they needed to focus. After stopping Tristan off at the DCPD Crime Lab, they arrived at the club, and snuck around the back, so as not to get caught by any unwanted members of security. All of them agreed that the best, well really the _only _place to start was out back, where the argument had happened, and maybe where the murder had taken place.

"Are we sure it happened here?" asked Duke. "I mean, there was so much blood in the bedroom, maybe they died there."

"Possible." Said Yugi. "But improbable, look what I found." He was staring a large spatter of blood, in fact more than one. "This is consistent with multiple stabbings, you guys. Er, I think. We'll have to ask Tristan."

"Multiple stabbings?" said Joey with an expression of disgust on his face. That's not good."

"No it's not, Joey. Listen, everyone. Maybe we should spend some time combing this area. I mean, is it possible that there's another clue here?"

The four combed the area as thoroughly as they saw fit, but no one found anything. Until –

"You guys?" asked Joey, a confused expression on his face. "Were these crates here last night? Because they sure as hell weren't out here when Mai and I were out here. Yug?"

"Well, they're crates of alcohol. Lyndsay gets them shipped in every Saturday night. Perhaps they arrived after you left."

Ryou suddenly gasped. He ran over to a crate that was against the wall, and pulled it away. He turned it around to show everyone what was on the back of it. Written in green ink were the words:

**FOLLOW THE CLUES, BOYS.**

"Shit!" said Duke, clearly shocked and terrified. "What the hell? Why would that psycho give us clues? What is it he hopes to gain from having us find out about him? To go to jail? To get the death sentence, perhaps?"

Yugi looked grave. "Well, what if he wants something from us? He could be giving us clues as to his whereabouts so as to try to make us give him something."

Ryou frowned. "That doesn't make any sense, he's got no leverage."

Yugi let out a small scream. "Oh my god!" He cried. "He's got Tea!"

"WHAT?"

"Don't you get it? He kidnapped Tea! He must have done! He killed Phoebe, or the other way round, whatever, and then took Tea, and he's gonna ask for a ransom of, well, probably the Egyptian God cards!"

"Oh….god." were the only words Joey seemed capable of uttering. "This is a complete nightmare. Why, why is this happening to us?"

"Lets stay calm, as Ryou oh-so-helpfully suggested." Said Duke. "We don't know anything for certain. It's all just speculation at the moment." All of a sudden, Duke's phone rang. He hurriedly answered. "Hello?" All the remaining three boys heard were mmms, and aaahs, and ohs. When Duke put the phone down, the expression on his face was a mixture of terror and reluctant resignation.

"That was Tristan. The blood in the hotel room was Phoebe's. She's….she's dead, you guys."

END OF CHAPTER SEVEN.

Ooooh, I hope it's getting good. Do you like it so far?

Random and useless note: Sorry for the shite Panic! reference. I just couldnt resist. Besides, i think Ryou likes Panic.


	8. Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi oh.

Warnings: A bit of bad language, but nothing too bad.

Chapter eight – The Cookie crumbles 

Four boys were standing in silence. Silence, apart from the muffled sobs that were emanating from Yugi, who was buried in Joey's arms. Duke was sitting down, shaking slightly, still clutching his phone. Ryou was pacing up and down, looking paler than ever.

"Guys, we have to do something. We cant just sit around and wait for inspiration, you know." Said Joey, rather unhelpfully. He himself felt sickened by the fact that Phoebe has been murdered, but he also knew that if they had any hope of finding Marik and saving Tea, they had to act fast.

"Well, what do you suggest we do?" asked Duke. "Unless he tells us what he wants from us and how to find him, we'll never get Tea back."

"I know what he wants." Said Yugi quietly. "Isn't it obvious? He wants the Egyptian God cards and the power they possess."

"God," muttered Duke. "I thought we'd got past all this. Apparently I was wrong."

"Wait" intoned Ryou. "Something doesn't add up. If Marik killed Phoebe because he got angry with her, when he found out about this other guy she liked, then why would he have taken Tea? Surely he would have panicked and tried to cover it up?"

"That's a good point." Said Yugi. "That indicates premeditated murder, but we already know that this was heat-of-the-moment kill."

"Do we?" asked Duke. "How can we even be sure that Marik killed her? There's nothing to say that he didn't get so mad he just stormed off, and left Tea and Phoebe alone. Two girls, even if one of them was Phoebe, would have no chance against a guy with a knife. Marik might have had nothing to do with it."

"No, that doesn't make sense." Argued Yugi. "If Marik had nothing to do with it we'd have found him by now. He wouldn't have disappeared. Besides, how does that explain the blood on their bed?"

"Maybe the murderer's idea was to incriminate Marik." Said Duke, determined that his idea of an outsider attacking was right.

"No, we'd still have found Marik."

"Well, what if he freaked out about the blood, and ran away, looking for her?"

Yugi thought about this. "Well, maybe. But if it _was _an outsider, who was it? And why would they want to kill Phoebe? There's only one person who could possibly have had a motive for the murder. And that's Marik."

"Well, what about Bakura?" asked Duke. "He's a crazed killer, he might have just decided it would be fun to kill someone."

"No!" said Ryou, stomping on this theory as quickly as he possibly could. "How did he get in, then? That gate's ten foot high, and you have to be buzzed in, he couldn't have got back in. Besides, where exactly do you propose he hid until he struck? There's nowhere to hide. Lyndsay would have seen him. And anyway, why would he kill her? They're old friends. Well, ancient friends, to be more specific. Plus, I saw him this morning, and whoever killed her has taken Tea."

Duke rolled his eyes. His theory that an outsider killed Phoebe seemed to be becoming less and less likely by the second. "Fine. Marik killed her. I get it. But why? There's no way he could have got that angry."

Yugi looked solemn. "A guy has been known to kill his girlfriend for less than betraying him for someone else."

"So, if he did do it, why did he choose to kidnap Tea? Surely he couldn't have thought of getting the Egyptain God cards that fast."

"Well, maybe he wanted to make sure she couldn't tell anyone?"

"Why didn't he just kill her?"

"Maybe because he didn't want to have even more blood on his hands. He kidnapped Tea so she wouldn't tell anyone. Simple. And later on, he decides, hey I can get the Egyptian God cards, by holding her for ransom. Or….or who knows, maybe he did kill her, we don't know."

Ryou looked sick. "So why is he playing this horrible game with us? Why doesn't he just tell us what he wants?"

Duke scoffed. "Because he's a fucking psychopath, that's why."

They sat and mused on this new information. Duke thought about all the arguments for it being Marik. They all made sense. All of his arguments for it being an outsider had been shot down. He could see how it was beginning to look impossible that it could have been anyone but Marik.

Ryou thought about Phoebe, and how awful it was that she should have been killed because she happened to like somebody other than Marik. He wondered to himself who it was. It was probably Kaiba, or Bakura, or someone like that. But then again….maybe it wasn't. Maybe it was Duke, or Joey, or Yugi, or Tristan. Or Ryou.

After ten minutes of vaguely inconsequential thinking, Duke suggested that they go back to Joey's house and get some food, and restore their energies. Yugi shuddered. "I don't wanna eat that pizza now…."

"Well, we can make sandwiches."

They looked at each other and decided that that would probably be the best idea in the circumstances. "Anyhow, Marik knows he can contact us at Joey's. Maybe we'll get another clue."


	9. Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh Chapter Nine – The Cookie Crumbles, part two 

They got back into Duke's car and went back to Joey's house. On the way, each boy sat thinking about the events that had occurred over the past day. It all seemed so surreal that the previous day, they had been having fun, partying with Yugi, and now…But they had to deal with the facts that had been presented to them. There was no turning back, although each wondered to themselves, if they hadn't been drunk from the spiked orange juice, and people hadn't been causing havoc inside, would any of them have been able to save her?

After twenty minutes of driving, they arrived back at Joey's house. Sandwiches were pretty much what everyone wanted, and Joey agreed that he'd make them. But not before going back to find his –

"Oh my God!"

"What?"

"My COOKIE! It's gone!"

"Joey!"

"I'm serious, it's gone!"

"Well, maybe Serenity ate it, Joey."

"If she did, I swear I'll….." He didn't finish, he simply went upstairs to yell at Serenity for eating his cookie. After a few minutes Joey came down the stairs to silence. He proceeded to go into the kitchen to begin the sandwiches. Or, look for another cookie.

"Er, Joey, I think you'd better come in here for a second!"

"What? Why?"

"Joey, just get in here!"

Joey sighed heavily but made his way into the living room.

"What the hell?" Joey had stopped dead in his tracks as he saw what was on his window. Written in large black ink were the words:

FOLLOW THE TRAIL OF CRUMBS. JOEY.

"What…What does that mean?"

Yugi looked forlorn. "It's a clue, isn't it? From Marik."

"It must be" said Duke. "But why is this one for Joey, instead of Yugi? The last one was for him."

They thought for a few minutes. And then inspiration struck Joey.

"My cookie!"

"For God sake Joey, enough with the damn cookie!"

"No, no, don't you get it? If my cookie wasn't eaten by any of you, or by Serenity, he must have been here in the house! That's what the clue means. See here….." he pointed to a collection of cookie crumbs where the cookie had been.

"Yes, but it's not exactly a clue, now is it? It tells us basically nothing."

"Yeah, I agree" chipped in Ryou. "Yugi's clue meant something. It practically told us what to do next. This doesn't tell us anything."

"That's not necessarily true." Said Yugi. "It might mean something, we just haven't figured out what that is yet."

"Well, I'm thinking we need to, and fast, because if Tea really has been kidnapped, then we have no chance if we cant even figure out these stupid psychopathic clues."

For the next ten minutes, each of them sat in silence desperately trying to work out what was going on.

Yugi sat thinking how unfair it was. Phoebe was as innocent as a person who had already tried to harm countless people got, and she hadn't deserved this. Everyone had been looking forward to Marik and Phoebe's return, but now everything was terrible. Just the night before they had been having so much fun…..Yugi knew he had to solve this puzzle. Yes, he had to put the pieces of this demented jigsaw together. But at the moment, there were far too many missing pieces.

Duke sat thinking about how horrible it was. So much blood. How could anyone do that to someone they loved? But, Duke supposed, Marik never really loved Phoebe, he probably was just using her the whole time to get to Egyptian God cards. It was a pity, because, as Duke recalled, she had had some serious trust issues. Finally put your trust in someone, and that's what happens, Duke thought to himself.

Ryou sat thinking about how odd it was. That Marik should have killed his girlfriend simply for three cards. He knew the murder hadn't really been planned, it was in the heat of the moment, but that didn't mean that Marik hadn't been intending to do it at some point. He just took advantage of his opportunity. Took advantage of his opportunity…..

END OF CHAPTER NINE

Rather a deranged way to end the chapter, but it will make sense later on, I swears it! Please review, dudes and dudettes, it will make my day.

Gotta go, the party boat calls………….


	10. Chapter 10

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh Chapter ten – Putting the pieces together Sunday, 10:00pm 

"Well, its getting late, you guys, I'd better go." Said Duke, to Ryou.

"What?" asked Joey, as he and Yugi came out of the kitchen, laden with chocolate bars, candy, and crisps. Duke noticed the absence of either pizza or any cookies. "Are you going already, Duke?"

"Yeah, it's getting a bit late, if I don't get enough sleep then I get bags under my eyes." Ryou and Yugi exchanged glances.

"Besides", continued Duke. "I'm not walking home in the middle of the night."

"Walking? You have a car."

"Yeah, but I thought I'd leave it here. If you guys get contacted by Marik, you don't want to have to waste time trying to find transport."

"Good point." Yugi nodded in agreement.

Duke threw the keys to his expensive Jag to Ryou, who, surprisingly, caught them expertly, considering the crapness of Duke's throw. "Well, I'll head off then. Any of you guys want a ride?" They all shook their heads.

"I'll get the bus. Or something." said Yugi. "To be fair, I live, like, three blocks away."

"And I don't really fancy going home tonight." Said Ryou. "My parents are away, and I think I'd rather not be alone."

"And, you know, I live here." Said Joey. They all glared at him. As Duke was just about to leave, Yugi and Joey looked at each other in what seemed to Ryou to be almost panic.

"Um, Duke, wait." Said yugi, running over to him. "Listen, watch out, OK? Joey and I were just talking in the kitchen, and, we, well, we think that you might be given a clue too. I mean, as in, all of us might get one. We were trying to come up with a reason why our clues havent added up to anything yet, and why two different people have received them. That's pretty much the best we could come up with."

Duke snorted. "Come on, guys, we're reaching a little there."

"Maybe so, but watch out anyway. I mean, Joey got that clue because it not only related to him, but to Marik. Or to the murder. Or something."

"And Yugi got the clue about the blood because…….."

"Well, we're still working that one out."

Duke nodded. "Fine. Call me when you have the answer." Duke left the house, and after he had gone, the three remaining boys looked at each other fearfully. No one had anything to say for a while. Ryou simply sat in silence, staring at the wall, clearly in deep thought. Yugi did the same. Joey too, but his silence was broken by the sound of his teeth crunching on Doritos. After a while, Yugi spoke up.

"You know, maybe we should get Tristan over here. We're smarter and stronger as a team. You know, friendship - "

"Yug, I'm gonna stop you right there." Joey cut in. "I do not need a friendship speech right now. It'll just remind me of Tea."

Yugi nodded regretfully. "I'm right though, right? I mean, about us all getting clues?"

"I guess you must be." Said Ryou. "I also think you're right about Tristan, so I guess I'll call him."

While Ryou called Tristan on his cellphone, Joey and Yugi talked. "I think you are right, you know, Yugi. I just hope Duke and Tristan are OK, you know, on their own out there."

Yugi half-smiled. "I'm sure they'll be fine. Besides, Tristan should be here soon. All the same, maybe we should just call Duke to make sure he got home OK. After all, his house cant be more than forty minutes walk, and it's been at least that."

Joey nodded and reached for the phone. But just as he was about to pick up the receiver, it rang. Yugi shuddered.

"I love it when it does that……." Said Joey. He picked up the phone. "Hello?"

"Jo….ey? Is that you?" It was Duke, and he sounded breathless.

"Duke? What's going on, buddy? Are you at home yet? We were just about to call ya."

"Joey. I…I don't think we're reaching any more."

"What?"

"I got a clue, Joey. From Marik. He was….he was there, when I was walking home. He must have followed me, Joey. He stopped me in the woods."

"The – the _woods_? Do you have a deathwish, man? Even if you're not being chased by a deranged killer, you don't go wandering in the woods at night. Hell, you don't go wandering in the woods at day."

"Joey! Trying to tell a story here!"

"Sorry, go on."

"I was in the woods, and I hard this rustling sound, but before I even had the chance to look around, I felt this hand on my shoulder. He said something about not a regular clue, just something about what the clues mean. I didn't really pay attention, I was too scared. But anyway, I thought he was done, because he stopped talking, and I was about to run away - "

"Run away? Without getting a good look at him? Duke!"

"ANYWAY!" cut in Duke.

"Sorry."

"Anyway, I was about to run away, but then he – he pulled some of my hair out!"

"He did what?"

"I know! I need _all _of my precious hairs!"

"Wait, did you say he pulled some of your hair out? Why would he do that?"

"I don't know! I'm still trying to figure it out."

Joey sighed. "OK. I'll tell the guys the story, and we'll see if it means anything to any of us. Tristan will be here in a minute, and he's the CSI. We'll call you if we think of anything." Joey hung up the phone.

Sunday, 11:30pm 

After Joey had repeated the story to Ryou, Yugi, and now Tristan, they were still stumped. But they had at least established one thing – they would all be getting a clue.

"This means be on your guard, Ryou, Tristan." Warned Yugi. "As Duke and Marik have demonstrated tonight, you never know when and where he's gonna strike."

" I just don't get it." Said Tristan. "I'm totally baffled. These clues mean nothing."

"Nothing yet." Reminded Yugi. "I'm sure when we figure this whole thing out, they'll all make perfect sense."

"Oh yeah, and when will that be? When Tea's dead, or when Yugi's lost his Egyptian God cards to Marik?"

"Look you guys." Chimed in Ryou. "We have to stay strong, or we'll never get to the bottom of this. Lets try the blood first. There must have been a reason Yugi got given that clue, we just don't know what it is yet."

Yugi considered this for a moment. And then something struck him. Something he couldn't believe he had forgotten until now.

"Oh my God! Last night!"

"What about it?"

"At the party – I got cut! Marik – he – he cleaned it up!"

"Oh! So that's what the thing with the blood was?"

"It must be! Oh, and you know what else I've just realized? That cookie! You know, that really disgusting one that Joey had, tasted like there was something wrong with it."

"So….wait, do you think this is all to do with the party?"

"I'm starting to!"

All of a sudden, the phone rang once more.

"Hello?"

"Joey, it's me again."

"Hey, Duke, you'll never guess what we've just figured out!"

"No kidding, because I've thought of something too."

"Hold on. Did some of you hair get pulled out at the party last night?"

"Yes! How did you know?"

"Way ahead of ya, buddy."

END OF CHAPTER TEN.

Please review, everyone!


	11. Chapter 11

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh. There is also a reference to yellow brick road in the Wizard of Oz (please ra, tell me I'm getting that reference right, because I've never seen that movie) which I don't own obviously

Chapter 11 – Follow the Yellow Brick Road

Yugi slowly opened his eyes and smacked his bedside alarm clock until it stopped buzzing. He rolled over on to his side to see that it was 9:00am on Monday morning. He was glad it was the school holidays – normally, his birthday, which was on June the 4th, fell at an inconvenient time, usually exams. But he was in no mood to get up and do any sleuthing, mainly because he was tired, stressed, and ached all over – sleeping on Joey's living room floor wasn't exactly five star luxury. In fact he had been rather hoping he would wake up in his own bed, and all the events of the previous day would never really have happened. He guessed that was too much to hope for as he dragged himself into Joey's kitchen to put on the kettle. He normally preferred milk or orange juice to coffee, but on that particular day, he needed black coffee.

After what had happened to Duke, the rest of the boys had agreed it was safer to stick together. Yugi wanted to wake they others, but he knew that if he did, they would have to start thinking about what had happened to Phoebe and Yugi didn't think he could handle that, especially this early in the morning. But unfortunately, he couldn't spare himself from thinking about it anyway. He paced the entire ground floor of Joey's house before stopping in the kitchen and sitting down with his coffee and bagel. Before long, he found tears rolling silently down his face, which was crumpled in pain. Phoebe had been dead less than two days, and they hadn't exactly stopped to mourn. OK, so he hadn't known her that well, but that didn't change the fact that it if wasn't for her they would probably all be in the shadow realm by now.

"Up early, are we?" Yugi turned his head sharply to see Ryou standing in the doorway, rubbing his eyes.

"Yeah, I am. I couldn't really sleep that well."

"I know the feeling."

Ryou sat down next to Yugi at the kitchen table. "All this detecting really takes it out of you."

"It's horrible, I know." Replied Yugi. "But I guess we'll have to do more of it today."

"I've just been thinking so much about it. All night, really." Ryou paused.

Yugi gave a weak smile. "You know where Marik is, don't you?"

Ryou looked genuinely shocked for a few seconds, but his expression gradually changed to defeated. "No. I really don't. But I have ideas."

Yugi nodded. "Me too."

Yugi and Ryou sat in silence for a few minutes while Yugi drank his coffee and Ryou stared into space. When Yugi had finished, Ryou suggested waking the others.

"Unless you think they'll get up on their own, Yugi."

Yugi laughed. "Yeah, I don't think so, somehow. Tristan is the kind of guy who needs his sleep, and Joey won't get up in the morning unless there's a possibility of food."

Ryou giggled. "Good point." He waited. "So, Yugi, do we really have to do more of this detecting stuff today? Because to tell you the truth………"

"I know, Ryou. Look, we could try to get out of it just for this morning. Tristan wont be happy, but we could always suggest going out for pizza, I'm sure Joey wouldn't say no."

"Sounds good. Um, except for the part about pizza. How about fish and chips, sorry, fries, or, or even burgers. I'm just a little put off by the whole concept of pizza right now."

"Works for me. So shall we get those two out of bed now or what?"

They proceeded into the living room, where Tristan and Joey were sleeping. After ten minutes of futile shouting, they decided to resort to poking. And after five minutes of poking, neither Joey nor Tristan was awake. "They have to be awake by now!" said Ryou.

"Oh, they _are _awake," whispered Yugi. "They just don't seem to feel like getting up. But I have an idea." He looked at Joey, whose eyes were still clamped tightly shut. "Oh, WOW, Ryou! Look at the size of this COOKIE!"

Joey's eyes instantly sprang open, and he pulled himself up as quickly as possible, tripping over his sleeping bag, and clonking his head on the table in the process.

"Owww…."

"Can't believe you bought that one, Joey. Man, that never gets old. Now the question remains, how do we get Tristan up?"

Ryou grinned.

"Morning, Serenity! What's that you say? You have a date with Duke Devlin?"

Tristan screamed and leapt out of bed.

"Hey, Serenity's not here!"

"No kidding, doofus."

"Look, you guys." said Yugi. "Ryou and I were thinking we could do something a little more fun that what we did yesterday? It's almost ten, why don't we hit the mall, then go out for burgers and shakes?"

Tristan laughed. "What are we, girls?"

"Ok, forget the mall. And the shakes. We could just go for the burgers. But we better wait for Duke to get here. I just called him."

"That sounds good, Yugi, but we really should - "

"But nothing! There's nothing we can do until we get the last two clues. So lets enjoy the time we have before that psycho gets us again. Come on, you guys, my treat." Insisted Yugi. They all looked at each other, but eventually nodded.

"By the way, Tristan," said Ryou. "We were just talking, and we think you and I should look out for the word "follow". I mean, it's been in 2 out of our 3 clues. Not to mention the original one. The one behind the crate."

"Yeah, that makes sense."

"Behind the crate….." Ryou mumbled to himself.

"What was that, Ryou, I didn't catch that last bit?"

"Never mind." Muttered Ryou.

"Oh, yeah and Tristan?" said Yugi. "Can you think of any weird things that happened last night at the party?"

"Lots of weird things happened at the party, Yugi."

"I mean, anything that could be relevant?"

"No, cant think of anything."

"That's OK, you know, maybe we're wrong about it being related to the party. I mean, it makes no sense. Marik killed Phoebe in the heat of the moment, so those clues couldn't have been planted."

Ten minutes later, Duke arrived, took off his sunglasses, placed them on the dashboard, and entered Joey's house.

"So, you guys ready to go? We're going for burgers, right?"

"That's right. Let me just get the keys to lock up." Joey grabbed the key from the key – holding thing and locked the front door. The boys hopped into Duke's car, ready for a taste of normality.

"Hey!" said Duke. "Where the hell are my sunglasses? I cant drive without them, I don't look half as cool!"

"Duke, we are not going back to your house to look for sunglasses."

"No, I just could have sworn I left them on the dashboard before I got out of the car. Oh well, maybe I left them in the glove compartment. Tristan, you're closest, could you check?"

Tristan opened the glove compartment. "Sorry, man, no sunglasses, just a piece of paper."

"Piece of paper? What is that?"

Tristan extracted the piece of paper and read what was on it aloud. "Follow the yellow brick road, Tristan." His face dropped, and his eyes became filled with fear. "Duke, what the hell is this?"

"What? I don't know!"

"It's….it's a clue, isn't it?"

"Wait a minute, how is that possible? How could he have possibly known we were going to randomly look in the glove compartment?"

Tristan looked petrified. "Because he knew Duke wouldn't want to drive without his sunglasses, and so would search the car for them."

"Wait…But that means he took the sunglasses! So he was here? Just a matter of minutes ago? Ok, that's the creepiest thing I've ever heard."

"I think we should be more focused on figuring out what this clue actually means. Tristan, any ideas?"

"None whatsoever. I hated that movie when I was a kid. Why would there be a reference to it in the clue?"

"I don't know. It's quite clever, though, isn't it? I mean, follow the yellow brick road, whatever. He's found something he can actually relate to that. Plus this makes sense, unlike, follow the trail of crumbs, which is completely daft, it's just like from that old story of hansel and gretel, where the kid leaves a trail of crumbs, or whatever."

Joey gave an unnatural giggle. "Hee hee, it's like some demented nursery rhyme come to life. Gimme the note." He took it. "Hey, the Y, the B, and the R are in capitals. Hee hee, Yellow Brick Road, Yellow Brick Road, YBR, YB – Oh god!"

"What? You're realizing that we're having to deal with your psychosis on top of everything else?"

"No." said Joey. "YBR. YBR. Tristan , don't you get it?"

"Get what?"

"Last night. The orange juice. The spiked orange juice. The shipping code, don't you remember? It was YBR."

"But….but that means….."

"I know what it means." Said Yugi. "It means Marik did plan this murder after all."

END OF CHAPTER ELEVEN

Please review, everyone! I know that chapter was slightly deranged, but hey.


	12. Chapter 12

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh or the whole Yellow Brick Road idea

Chapter 12 – just general badness

"So." Said Yugi. "What are we gonna do?"

"What do you mean?" asked Ryou. "I thought we were going out for burgers." His face dropped at the realization that this probably wouldn't be happening.

"We can't do that now, Ryou, not after this. We said we'd wait until he contacted us and he has. So to be honest, I'm all for going back into the house and trying to figure this thing out."

"But…but I can't!" Ryou seemed almost panicked. "Not after yesterday. I need normality!"

"All right, Ryou, calm down." Said Tristan reassuringly, always practical. "We can go out for the burgers, but on the one condition that we have to start working on this little problem of ours as soon as we get back to Joey's house. I mean, I know I'm going to spend the entire burger – eating time thinking about what this clue means and how it pieces together with the other ones, and I'd advise you all to do the same. Otherwise we'll never get anywhere."

Ryou didn't look happy, but nodded. "Agreed."

They arrived at the burger bar, and sat in silence eating. They tried to make forced conversation, but nothing really came of it. But they all knew they were having far more fun than they had the previous day.

"So, guys, I don't mean to spoil the mood or anything," said Duke, "but what are we going to do when we get back to Joey's?"

"Well, I have an idea," chipped in Yugi, "I think we should make a timeline type thing, you know of everything that happened on Saturday. That way, we'll get a really clear picture of what went on. And we can look out for anything that might be a clue."

"That's a really good idea," said Tristan, "We should definitely do that, It'll really help. I mean, if they clues are relating to the night of the party after all. Which I suppose they must be. And I guess they also relate to the murder itself, if Yugi's clue is anything to go by."

"Yeah, that's true." Added Joey. "But we still haven't figured out how Tristan's clue relates to the murder. I mean, we know how it relates to Saturday night. Oh, and speaking of which, how did Marik manage to mark those orange juice cartons with the letter YBR, when he only arrived that night. I mean, they were shipped the day before, right?"

"That's right, Joey. "said Yugi. "He must have snuck into the club earlier in the day. He and Phoebe arrived in the afternoon, remember?"

"Oh yeah, that's right."

They finished their burgers in silence and when everyone was finished, they decided to head back. "I mean, we may as well make a start, right?" as Tristan put it.

When they got back to Joey's, they were glad to see that this time, no unpleasant surprises were there waiting for them, but they had the ominous feeling that the worst was yet to come.

"So how are we gonna do this, you guys?" Joey wanted to know. "Should we all pool our ideas, then make a, er, whats the word? Oh right, chronological plan of the events of last night?"

"Joey, where did you learn that word?" Yugi wanted to know.

Joey looked embarrassed. "I copied it off Tristan's notes."

"You made notes?" Duke enquired, looking quizzically at Tristan.

"That's what a good detective does." Replied Tristan proudly.

"Er, OK. Let's get on with the timeline, shall we?"

They spent the next half our deliberating, OK, more like arguing, about who had been doing what, at what time, and where on the night in question ("No, I was there!" "You were not, you were in the bathroom!" "Where the hell was Ryou?" "I think Tristan was talking to - " "No, I was outside!" "Oooh, well sorry, my mistake!" "Calm down!" "Do you really expect me to believe you weren't looking at - " "I was not!" "Where the hell was - " "I do not think I would go in to the ladies bathroom, thank you very much!" "Why not? Something you're not telling us?" "OK, that's it, I'm gonna kick your - " "It must have been a mistake, Mai was with her" "The hell she was, you were!" "Care to explain why you were - " "I was not, I was over there, by the bar!" "Because…?" "Oh, you could not be more wrong!" "Where the hell was Ry - " "That's not right, Tristan!" "Well, what else have we got?" "Where the hell was RYOU!").

After a half hour of this, they finally got something down on paper, something that was at least legible, and at least made sense. Shocking really, since it was, in the large part, written by Duke.

Our Timeplan, by Duke Devlin.

Saturday, 3:30pm

Phoebe calls Yugi

Yugi goes to meet us at the movies

6:00pm

Phoebe calls Tea (we _think, _Joey talked to her)

Joey and Tristan meet Serenity at the train station

Duke begins fixing his hair

7:00pm

Yugi leaves the house to go to the club

Ryou leaves the house to pick up the snacks

8:00pm

Yugi finishes decorating

Duke arrives

Ryou and crazy arrive

8:30pm

Tea arrives

Tristan arrives

Joey arrives

Serenity arrives

Random people from school arrive

8:40pm

Mai arrives

Yugi drink his first "orange juice"

Joey, Yugi and Tristan discuss with Lyndsay the weirdness of the food

8:50pm

Yugi, Tristan, Tea and Joey talk

8:55pm

Tea goes off somewhere

Joey and Yugi too

Ryou is talking to Serenity

"Huh? Mai was with Serenity then."

"Joey, we're trying to make a timeline here, this is very specific work!"

"Sorry……"

9:00pm

Tea and Joey return to say hi to Yugi

Phoebe and Crazier (good nickname, in my opinion) arrive

Crazy and Crazier get together. We assume.

Ryou finally turns up

"Where _were _you?"

"Sssshhh!"

9:10pm (approx.)

Tea talks to Phoebe

Rest of us are talking by bar

9:15pm

Tea talks to Joey about Phoebe

Crazy and Crazier tip orange juice on Yugi's head

"OK, can we just call them Marik and Bakura?" asked Joey. "I'm getting confused!"

Duke sighed. "Fine. But if you ask me, the nicknames I've given them are appropriate."

Marik cleans up Yugi's cut, and gets rid of the cloth (We really really hope)

9:20pm

Yugi and Tea talk

Tristan annoys Serenity, Joey tries, and fails to get rid of him

9:40pm

Yugi meets up with Joey and asks him what he has been doing

Ryou is in the bathroom, searching for Bakura, who is, presumably,

"What was that, Yugi?"

oh right, "terrorizing children" with Marik

Tea is with Tristan and Serenity

Duke is grooming his hair

10:30pm

Duke is talking to Serenity

He then goes off to find Mai

Serenity goes to the bathroom

"Now, Joey, do you think you can remember exactly what time it was you and Mai went back into the club, because Phoebe said she saw you guys go back in as she and Tea came out."

"Um, I think it was about 25 to."

"Excellent."

10:35pm

Joey and Mai go back in club

Tea and Phoebe come out of club

About 10:40pm

Duke arrives

Tea is in bathroom

About 10:42pm

Duke goes back in club

Marik and Bakura exit club

About 10:50pm (according to Yugi, this is about when Lyndsay had to break up a few fights, and people were getting "really crazy" inside the club)

Lyndsay hears Marik and Phoebe arguing and sees those two plus Tea outside, then goes back in to the club to sort out the fighting

"That's it. We don't know anything else. We don't know enough." Duke looked forlorn.

"I think you're right, we don't know enough," said Yugi. "But at least we have everything pretty clear."

"Yep." Said Joey. "I have everything perfectly clear. I just have one question."

He turned to look at Ryou.

"Where the hell were you all night?"

END OF CHAPTER 12

PLEASE REVIEW!


	13. Chapter 13

Disclaimer: Don't own Yu Gi Oh. I also stole the bit with the pentagram from Charmed – don't own. Chapter 13 – An extra clue 

Ryou looked uncomfortable. He shifted in his seat slightly. His face had gone as pink as it went, which was, well, slightly pink.

"Well?"

"Well, I was with you guys most of the time. You know that."

"Not according to this. In fatc, I actually remember wondering where you were."

"He turned up when marik arrived."

"Not a good sign."

"Look, Ryou, if you had something to do with this, or if you know where Marik is, you have to tell us now, or else we'll never find him."

Ryou's eyes filled with tears. "I don't, I swear I don't! Please believe me! Look, on Saturday night, I really was just hanging around, minding my own business. I didn't do anything bad. How could I? And I really don't know where Marik is hiding Tea. Don't you think I would say if I did?"

"Fine. But I still think it's suspicious that the first time we saw you all night was when Marik showed up."

Tristan interrupted here. "Look, guys, it's not important. We'll probably find out when we get Ryou's clue."

"But, Tristan," said Duke. "The whole point of the timeline was to try and figure our what Ryou's clue might be, and we don't have anything to go on."

"Well, if Ryou says he was just hanging around, then that's the truth. OK?"

"I guess……" Duke looked wary, but kept his silence. "So what now? Are we going to try and figure out yours, Tristan?"

"Don't bother, I've already come up with something."

"You have? Why didn't you say something before?"

"Well, I thought of it while we were making the timeline, and I didn't want to interrupt."

"Well? What is it?"

Tristan cleared his throat. "There's this road uptown, that this guy lived on, and he did a lot of work on the Yellowstone Caldera, you know, that thing that's gonna explode sometime soon. Anyway, he was, like, a famous scientist, or something, so they decided to rename the road after the work he did. Anyway, they called it Yellowstone Drive."

"Yeah," said Joey. "I know that. It's near that great burger joint, you know - "

"Can I finish?" said Tristan. "I just thought Yellowstone Drive, well that could be Yellow Brick Road, right? I mean, it makes sense."

"Yeah, but what has it got to do with anything?"

"How about the fact that DCPD Crime Lab is on it? Where my dad works?"

"So what do we have to do about it?"

Tristan paused. "Maybe analyse something else."

They sat in silence, mulling over this new information. Ryou wondered if they perhaps needed to go back to the "crime scene" to check some more things out. But he knew he wasn't exactly in the rest of the gang's good books at that moment, and they wouldn't be too keen to try out any of his suggestions, even though he knew, and they probably knew too, that he had had nothing to do with it. But if he told them he had been hanging out with Bakura, what would they assume? Ryou shuddered. He kept quiet, as did everyone else, for the best part of five minutes, before the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it." Volunteered Tristan. He went to the door, opened it, only to find there was no one there. "Huh." Tristan noticed that there was a small piece of paper folded up underneath the doormat. He rolled his eyes, knowing by now what this meant,. It was another clue from their good friend Marik. He re entered the living room and showed the rest of the guys the letter, which he read out loud.

"Dear Ryou, Yugi, Joey, TriStan, and Duke. I hope this letter finds you well. I'm sure you have realised by now that I planned the murder I committed, and I'm sorry I led you to believe it occurred in the heat of passion. My clues have reached you, I am sure, but I know you do not yet know what they mean. If you EVEr hope to find me and save Tea, I know you will need assistance. All I will say is this. Find a map of the city. Yugi, I believe you will know what to do. And for goodness sake, don't forget the scene of the crime. Five is, after all, a lucky number. For you. I have to say, I think I prefer three. Yours sincerely, Your FrieNd."

"Well," said Joey. "That was….weird."

"Anyone have any idea what any of this means? What's the lucky number business?"

Yugi frowned. "Well, there's five of us, so he thinks five is our lucky number. And three's his because….."

"Because of the three Egyptian God Cards." Finished Ryou.

"So what do we do?"

Yugi smiled. "I think I know."


	14. Chapter 14

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh

Chapter 14 – Ryou puts the pieces together 

Tristan, Yugi, Ryou, Joey and Duke all jumped into Duke's car for what felt like the millionth time in the space of about two days.

"Ah, man, after this I'm never gonna be able to take public transport again," commented Joey.

Ryou was too nervous to laugh. He was wondering if where they were going now was going to lead to their final clue. He could feel the nerves building up, twisting his stomach in knots. His heart was beating a mile a minute. Why did it have to be him? Why should he have to be last clue? Everyone was counting on him to know what to do. What if he had no idea, or he accidentally lead them in the wrong direction? Or worse, what if the clue led them in a direction Ryou knew he didn't want? He gulped. He didn't want to hope that the clue wasn't at the game shop, but inside he was praying it. He clutched the side of his hair, grasping his hair. He was shaking.

"Ryou, buddy, are you OK? You don't look too good."

"Oh. I'm fine, thank you, Joey. I'm just a little nervous to see my clue, that's all. To be honest, I think I'd rather be taken by surprise." He forced a laugh.

"If you're sure." Joey returned to the conversation he had been having with Tristan on the best type of luncheon meat, and Ryou returned to his thoughts.

After fifteen minutes or so, "OK, everybody, we're there." Said Duke. The boys got out of the car. It was now night time, so the shop was shrouded in darkness. Yugi could just about make out the sign on the front of the shop. He prayed his grandfather wasn't still awake, but he normally went to bed early, and encouraged Yugi to do the same.

"You guys?" asked Ryou. "Don't you think it's maybe a better idea to wait until it's morning?"

"Aww, Ryou! If we don't do this now, we'll have to wait all night! I didn't come all the way out here just to camp on the street overnight." Joey was indignant.

"He's right, Ryou." Put in Tristan. "If we don't do this now we may not get a chance to stop Marik."

Ryou sighed. "Fine. Let's go in. How bad could it be?"

They entered the dark game shop. The lights were all out, and Yugi could just about make out something on the walls. He fumbled for the lightswitch, while Joey commented,

"Remember, Ryou, think about anything that happened last night to do with Marik. Your clue's gonna be related to it." Ryou closed his eyes and swallowed.

Finally Yugi found the lights. But he was about to wish he hadn't. The five boys were met with a sight that terrified them more than anything they had seen yet. On each of the three walls, the one behind the counter, the one on their left and the one on their right, in what Yugi prayed was red paint, were the words:

FOLLOW YOUR HEART, RYOU.

Duke, Tristan, and Joey each looked at one of the walls and repeated the words to themselves.

"Follow your heart, Ryou," said Joey in awe.

"Follow your heart, Ryou," said Duke in disgust.

"Follow your heart, Ryou," said Tristan in terror.

……."And it will lead you right to me." Said Ryou in a small but horrified voice. e was standing at the He was He was standing at the door, looking at the back of it, to which a note was attached. Yugi rushed over to join him. He grabbed the note and repeated the fatal words.

"And it will lead you right to me……" Yugi looked stunned. "Ryou, anything to do with a heart on Saturday night? In any sense?" he asked pointedly.

Ryou was in no condition to answer. He was crumpled on the floor, crying his eyes out, shaking with grief and terror.

"Ryou, what's going on? Do you know something we don't?"

Ryou looked up. His face was stained from the tears, and his eyes were red. He looked at Tristan with an expression nothing short of hatred. When he spoke, his words were filled with anger, sorrow and pain.

"Tristan. Go back to the hotel room."

"Um - " Tristan seemed panicked. "Um, what? What do you mean, Ryou?"

"Tristan. Go back to the hotel room and test the blood on the BED!" He screamed. "Not the fucking door!"

Tristan comprehended at once and rushed out of the shop. Yugi, Joey, and Duke were all staring at Ryou, who proceeded to go to the door. "Come on, we're going."

"Er, where?"

"My place."

They followed Ryou out the door, leaving everything as it was in the shop. Duke looked at Yugi in confusion. "Yug, why are we going to his house? He hasn't been there in days."

Yugi looked ominous. "Oh, because home is where the heart is."

Duke got in and began to drive. His heart was now racing too. Two exciting trips in one night was a little too much for Duke. Not that he hadn't done exciting things in his life. He had never done the detective thing, that was for sure. If it weren't for the fact that Phoebe was dead and Tea was missing, he would have been having fun. But this drive was just about the opposite of fun. He counted not one, not two, but nine times Ryou told him to hurry up, and to cap it all off, his car ran out of gas in the middle of the freeway.

"Duke!" Ryou cried. "Ever heard of gas stations!"

"What? Over the last few days, I've been using it a hell of a lot more than I usually do, OK?"

"Not OK! We need to get to my place!"

Joey groaned. "Does this mean we have to walk?"

"More like run." Responded Ryou coldly. He set off. Joey sighed as the others attempted to catch him up. It was fifteen minutes later that the four arrived at Ryou's house. They were all quite breathless, but entered the house all the same.

"Where are your folks, Ryou?"

"Away. Till tomorrow."

"Just like mine!"

"Well, they are all at the medicine conference."

"Hey, I didn't know your Dad was a doctor, Joey?"

"Brain surgeon."

"Ha! How'd you end up so…you know?"

"Shut up."

The got in the house, and started to climb the stairs. "Why do we always have to do these things in the dark?" muttered Joey.

When they arrived at Ryou's bedroom, they were all expecting him to hesitate at least a little, or show fear. But he almost kicked the door in.

In a split second, everything changed. They felt as if it was over. Everything was over. A million things zoomed through their minds in that split second, none more than in Ryou's. There was a body, hanging from the ceiling by its wrists. The body had seven or eight stab wounds, but there was very little blood. The face was almost purple, the lips blue. But that wasn't why they were staring.

It was Marik.

END OF CHAPTER 14

Yay! Sorry to all Marik lovers. But yeah, he's dead. Find out who killed him in the next chapter! But only if I get reviews! (to be fair, you probably all already know)


	15. Chapter 15

Disclaimer: Don't own Yu Gi Oh

Chapter 15 – The explanation

"Oh…dear…God" said Duke. "What is Marik doing dead? Seriously, Ryou, what the hell?"

Joey looked at Ryou. "Did you do this?"

Ryou gave Joey a vague expression. "No. I guess not."

Yugi went over to Ryou, to try and comfort him a little. To be fair, by this point, he looked as if he were almost beyond grief. No tears fell from his eyes, but he looked dazed, almost as if he had been given some sort of drug for the pain. But what Yugi didn't understand was why. "Ryou? Ryou, listen to me. This is important. Did you know Marik was dead?"

Ryou shook his head. "No. Not really. In the back of my mind I've had suspicions about this whole thing, but I suppose they never really came to anything. I just went with what you guys all thought. But I see now that I was right."

"OK. Ryou, you need to tell us everything you know. You clearly know who killed Marik and Phoebe - "

"Yugi, don't be stupid." Said Ryou calmly. "Phoebe's not dead."

"Not dead?" said Yugi patiently. "Then, Ryou, how is it we found her blood in that room?"

"I'll bet you any money Tristan calls back to tell us the blood on the bed is Marik's, not Phoebe's. He knew we wouldn't see the message on the door until last. He knew we would only think to take a sample from the door because it was easier."

"Who, Ryou? Who knew this?"

"The murderer." Replied Ryou simply. "And I know who it is, but I suppose first I need to tell you how."

Yugi nodded. "Go on."

"Well, it all started to develop in my mind the day we found the message behind the crate. I thought to myself, how did Marik get that message there? When did he do it? And more importantly, when were those crates delivered?"

"Why is that important?"

"It's essential. Those crates must have been delivered after Lyndsay saw those two outside because otherwise she wouldn't have said that there was nothing outside but those three. Because if they had been there, someone could have hidden behind one of them. Right? Therefore, we have to come to the conclusion that they were delivered after Marik killed Phoebe. But that doesn't work either. Because Marik would have had to leave Tea alone wherever she was holed up to go back and put the message there. And she might have escaped. Besides, if they weren't delivered until after he had left, how did he know they were there?"

"He might not have." Put in Duke. "He might have just been planning to put the message on the wall, but when he saw the crates, decided to leave it on there."

"But, Duke, he still would have had to risk leaving Tea alone. What if she had escaped, or someone had found her?"

"So what does that leave us with?"

"Well, they certainly couldn't have been delivered just after he killed her, and before he had left, because the delivery people would have seen the body. That leaves us with one option. They were delivered _during _the fight. Marik and Phoebe would have put their argument on hold, said hello to the delivery people, and when they had left, resumed their argument."

"Well, that leaves us with the same conclusion. That Marik killed her."

"Ostensibly, yes. But I started to think. The conclusion we had come to was that no one could have come out of the club to kill Phoebe, because Marik would have protected her. And no one could have come in from the outside gate, because you have to know the code. But look! Someone could have got in!"

"Oh my God. You mean someone could have got in with the crate delivery people?"

"Why not? All they would have to do would be to sneak in behind the crate guys, and when they were gone this person would have the perfect hiding place. It makes sense. Plus it adds up with something I had thought about earlier which didn't make any sense at the time."

"What?"

"The message itself. Why would the killer have put it behind the crate, on the side which was nearest the wall, where no one might ever find it? And how did the killer put it there, without risking Tea escaping while he was doing it? The conclusion I came to was that the killer put that message on the back of the crate because he had no choice in the matter. i.e., that's where he was hiding before he killed anyone."

"So you think someone hid behind the crate, wrote the message there, then waited for his moment and struck?"

"That's exactly what I think."

"Well, who?"

"Someone who had been planning Marik's murder ever since he heard that Marik was returning to Domino. Someone who had the motive and means for the crime. Someone who was given their opportunity by Marik and Phoebe's fight."

"_WHO!"_

Ryou smiled wanly. "Who's the only insane murderer with a motive to kill for something like the millenium rod that you guys know?"

They gasped. "_Bakura?"_

"Yep. Insane tomb robber it is."

"How? How can it be Bakura? He was-he was the most obvious person. And we never even thought of him!"

"Nope." Said Ryou simply. "You never thought of him."

"You did?"

"Well, of course. He was really the most likely person to commit the crime all along. If only we had realised sooner that it was Marik who was dead, we might have had this thing figured out - "

"In time?" cut in Joey.

"No." said Ryou. "Marik was probably dead before eleven o clock Saturday night. And I really think Tea is still alive. We can still save her."

"OK, I'm really confuzzled." Said Joey. "Can we have one of those really long winded explanations of how the murderer did it, please, Ryou?"

"Certainly." Agreed Ryou. "Here goes. We start on Saturday, early afternoon, when I inform Bakura that Marik and his girlfriend will be returning to Domino later that day. I suppose that's when the idea of the millenium rod comes back into his head. He knows it wont just be a simple matter of stealing it, it will be more difficult than that. The idea of killing Marik enters his head. But how will he do it? He decides the party is a good time. But he anticipates it might be difficult to get Marik away from his girlfriend. So he gets the idea of kidnap. At first, of course, his idea is that he may have to kidnap Phoebe, and so he plants clues for us accordingly. He spikes the cookie with some sort of bad tasting stuff, he plants the letters, YBR, and so on. When he gets Marik on his own, there's his opportunity. He takes Marik outside. But unfortunately, Phoebe's out there. He's getting ready to try and take her, but then Tea comes out of the toilets, and there's too many people to try and take on at once. So he has to think quickly. He remembers that the alcohol crates are getting delivered that night, looks around, realises they aren't there, so assumes they are still to arrive. So he leaves. Earlier in the night, Marik has somehow found out Phoebe likes someone else, and so confronts her with the information. Tea sits down after trying to break up the fight. When the crates arrive, Bakura sneaks in with them, and hides behind one of them, preparing his message. He assumes he'll get his opportunity to kill Marik after Tea and Phoebe have left. But then he starts to pick up on what they're saying. He realises Phoebe is in love with someone else. And guess who it is? That's right, it's him. And so everything begins to fall into place for Bakura's quick brain. He realises he can get Phoebe out of the way without having to do anything at all, he can kidnap Tea with ease, because he'll have someone to help, he can hold her ransom and pick up a couple more millenium items courtesy of Yugi, and all because Marik and Phoebe have provided him with the perfect opportunity."

"Wait. Are you trying to tell me that Bakura killed Marik in front of Phoebe and Tea?"

"That's right. Which makes the situation twice as bad. Three guesses why?"

They only needed one. "Because he's got Phoebe on his side." Said Yugi desperately.

END OF CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

Well, that was a fun chapter. I know the explanation was rather long, but it did serve its purpose. At least everything makes sense now.


	16. Chapter 16

Disclaimer: Don't own Yu Gi Oh.

Chapter 16 – Ryou bores everyone some more (What? Chapter titles are hard)

Ryou, Yugi, Joey and Duke stood in Ryou's bedroom, still shocked by the sight that lay before their eyes. But at least now they understood what had happened.

"OK. Ryou. Just one more time. Condense it, if you like." Said Duke.

"Fine. Phoebe is in love with Bakura. Bakura realises this. Marik starts to get violent with Phoebe. Bakura leaps out to the rescue and kills him. Phoebe's grateful and so agrees to help him get the millenium items. They kidnap Tea. The end."

"No way. I'm sorry, but no way. Phoebe's not stupid. Surely she would have realised why Bakura killed Marik after he mentioned getting the items? Besides, she didn't find it a little suspicious that he just happened to be hiding behind the crates at the time?"

"I don't know. Love conquers all, I suppose."

"Love conquers all? Not exactly Phoebe's motto."

"I guess. So maybe he did kill Phoebe after all. Couldn't risk her getting in the way."

Joey shook his head. "I don't think so, you guys. Look at this." Joey had been looking around the body, and had noticed a note taped to Marik's back. He ripped it off and read it aloud.

"Dear Ryou, Yugi, Tristan, Joey and Duke.

I'm sure you have, by now, figured out how Marik ended up dead and I am still alive. If you ever want to see Tea again, deliver the millenium necklace and the millenium puzzle to lot 827, Domino City Pier. We thought an abandoned warehouse would be perfect for holing up until we got what we wanted. If you are not there at 10:00am on Tuesday the 7th of June, she will die. If you contact the police, she will die. Thank you for cooperating. Love you,

Phoebe Walker.

"It's from Phoebe. That's weird."

"There's one thing I still don't get, though. In that letter, you know, the one that told us how to find Ryou's clue, he said his lucky number was three. Why did he say that?"

"Ooh, I already worked that out." Said Ryou. "See here, all the letters in capitals, right? Well, they spell out seven. Which means his real lucky number is seven. As in, the seven millenium items. As opposed to the three Egyptian God cards."

Yugi glanced at Ryou. "You know, you seem to be handling this awfully well."

"Well." Said Ryou sadly. "These things happen."

"But…but they _shouldn't _happen! Not to you, Ryou. I'm so sorry."

"Don't be sorry, Yugi. It's not you who killed Marik."

"But, I know I wouldn't be happy about it if my boyfriend killed someone."

"My-my what?"

"Ryou, come on. We're not daft. You love him, right?"

Ryou felt that at this point denying it would be futile. "Right."

"So, you need some time. Maybe we should do this without you. I mean, if seeing him would freak you out."

"No! No, I might be the only way to get Tea back, I need to be there."

"All right then." After a few minutes, they came to the decision that they should just go back to Joey's house and try to get a good night's sleep. It was already eleven, and they needed some energy.

"I don't know how I'm gonna be able to sleep at all tonight." commented Joey as they went back into his house. Oh, and just so I know, what are we gonna do about Tristan? Call him?"

"no, leave it, Joey. We can talk to him in the morning."

"Huh. Boy, have we got a story for him."

"Yeah. So, sleep? Everyone good with that?" They got into their sleeping bags and closed their eyes. They fell asleep one by one. Pretty soon, Ryou, Yugi and Duke heard Joey snoring, and about twenty minutes after that, Yugi and Ryou heard Duke drift off.

It was another two hours before Ryou heard Yugi's heavy breathing indicating he was finally asleep. Ryou himself drifted off about an hour before they had to get up.

END OF CHAPTER 16

Ok, everyone, guess what, my computer's broken, I can never start a new fanfiction again. Therefore, I'm trying to shove everything I can into this one. And what I'm lacking right now is romance. So, lets take a poll. Ryou/Bakura scene? Yay or nay?


	17. Chapter 17

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh 

A/N: Not gonna do any romance. I'd probably be fairly crap at it anyway, I'm not really a romantic sort of person, thank God. So, more blood and violence! Yay! Getting near the end now…..

Chapter 17 – A meeting with Bakura (OK, these chapter titles are just getting worse)

Yugi's eyes blinked open as he felt himself being shaken. He saw a spike of brown hair and knew immediately that it was Tristan.

"Hey…Tristan. What are you doing here?" Yugi mumbled, still half asleep.

"Buddy, I got some crazy news."

"You do? Wait until you hear what happened after you left last night."

"OK, but first, you gotta hear this. You know the blood on the bed at Marik and Phoebe's hotel room?"

"Let me guess. It belonged to Marik."

"How did you know?"

"Oh, because we found his dead body in Ryou's bedroom last night."

"You what?"

"Let me give you the shortened version: Marik's dead, Bakura's the killer, Phoebe's working with Bakura, oh, and is still alive, by the way, and Tea's being held for a ransom of my millenium items."

Tristan looked stunned. "So I really missed a lot, huh?"

"Are you even surprised?"

"No. Not really. It makes more sense than what we had, we were just stupid, I guess. But why's Phoebe working with him?"

Yugi sighed. "Because she thinks he saved her life."

"Why would she think that?"

"Oh, forget it. It's all Marik's stupid fault. Not that we should speak ill of the dead."

"Right. So, did Ryou explain it all then?"

"Yes. How did you know?"

"Call it a lucky guess. He was pretty much whacked out last night."

"Bakura's his yami, Tristan, it's gotta be a bit of a blow to learn he killed a guy, admittedly, a pretty bad guy himself, but still a person."

"True. But what the hell was he even doing on Saturday? We never found out."

Yugi grimaced. "Frankly, I don't want to know."

Yugi and Tristan managed, with difficulty, to get Joey and Duke up, but before Tristan went to hit Ryou, Yugi grabbed his arm.

"Maybe Ryou should sit this one out, Tristan. He's been through enough."

Joey frowned. "No, Yug, he can't. He said it himself last night, he might be our only chance to rescue Tea."

Yugi gave in. "Fine. Continue." Tristan eventually got a sleep deprived Ryou out of bed.

So, what's the plan?"

"Well, it's half nine already. We have to be there at ten, so we'd better go. We don't want to risk being late."

They jumped into Duke's car, and set off for the Domino pier. It was an area they were all fairly familiar with. They had even been on a field trip there before. Funny how their teacher thought it would thrill them to visit an abandoned box factory. Anyway, there had been storage facilities, warehouses, and rented lots there for years, but they all had to admit they never in a million years would have thought of looking here for Bakura and Tea, no matter how many clues they had been given. They were just glad it would all be over soon. Yugi would give Bakura what he wanted, and Tea would be safe. There was nothing else to be done. But as they approached lot 827, Yugi began to get nervous.

Ryou didn't appear to be holding up well either. He clearly was terrified of what was about to happen.

The five reluctantly entered the warehouse, and looked around for a few seconds before they spotted them. Bakura was standing in the middle of the desolate room, dressed in his blue shirt and jeans, his black coat hanging off him, his white hair falling gracefully in front of his cold brown eyes. The expression on his face was nothing short of evil.

Around his shoulders was an arm that belonged to Phoebe, who was standing next to him. She stroked his hair, shooting a malicious smirk at Ryou. She was looking similarly evil, still dressed entirely in black, her ebony hair tossed behind her shoulders, her white teeth shining. Bakura was holding a long, sharp knife which looked more than deadly.

"Don't come any closer, boys." Said his cold, vindictive voice. "Phoebe, would you go fetch Miss Gardner for me?"

Phoebe acquiesced, and retired into the back room, presumably to bring Tea.

"Bakura!" shouted Ryou rather unexpectedly. "How could you? Why? I thought you were OK! But you're not! You're….you're despicable! How….how could I ever…" Ryou couldn't finish. He buried his face in his hands. Yugi thought he detected a flicker of emotion in Bakura's stone cold eyes.

"Too late, Ryou. What's done is done. I can't turn back now. So I guess you hate me. Well, I'll just have to live with that, won't I?"

It suddenly struck Yugi that Phoebe had been gone an awfully long time. It was at that instant that she brought Tea back into the room.

"Tea!" cried Yugi. "Are you OK?"

"I've been better, Yugi, but I'll be OK. Just don't give him anything on my account, do you understand?"

"Tea, we're here to save you!"

"Don't!"

"What?"

"You can't! You can't give your millenium items up for me!"

Phoebe looked pissed. "Would you two girls shut the hell up?" She smacked Tea around the head. Bakura, who had been watching this exchanging of words, turned back to face the boys.

"Well. What's it going to be, Yugi? Your girlfriend, or your gold necklace?"

"You're one to talk!" spat out Yugi.

Bakura flinched. "Give them to me now, little Yugi, or you will be sorry."

It was at this point that Yugi noticed Phoebe was whispering something to Tea. Tea was nodding her head, looking understandingly at Phoebe. Then, Phoebe gently released Tea's arm. Tea stood still for a few moments while Phoebe slowly walked behind Bakura.

It happened like a flash of lightning. Phoebe's combat boots kicked Bakura in the back of the head, knocking him down to the floor.

"Take Tea!" screamed Phoebe. Tea ran forward into Yugi's arms.

The scene had gone from tense silence to utter chaos. Joey, Tristan and Duke were charging forward to Bakura, who had just gotten off the floor. They had menacing looks on their faces. The scene that ensued was violent, but fairly inconsequential. All three boys got cut by the knife at least twice, while Phoebe prepared to strike Bakura again. Bakura had regained his composure, however, and was even quicker than they had anticipated. In a matter of seconds he had Joey, Tristan and Duke on the ground, pretty beaten up. But he still had Phoebe to contend with. Despite being a girl, she had a damn good right hook, and punched him in the face as hard as she could. He fell to the floor, blood trickling down from his nose, marring his smooth pale face.

"What was that for, you bitch? I thought you were on my side?"

"I don't think so, asshole!" she snapped, and kicked him hard in the stomach. "Were you ever on mine? Er, no, you were just using me, trying to get me to believe your half cocked story about "killing him to protect me". You think I'm retarded, or something?"

"No." choked out Bakura. "You're the smartest girl I've ever met."

"Oh, now flattery? You're pathetic."

"That wasn't a compliment. That's going to get you killed one of these days."

"Shut up, you albino freak of nature. You'll get what's coming to you."

"Oh, will I?" asked Bakura, getting some of his evilness back as he regained his posture, standing up to face Phoebe. "I don't think so, somehow."

He grabbed Phoebe and pulled her in towards him. She was about to react, but had clearly forgotten he had a knife, which he now held to her throat.

"You think this is the end?" she spat. "You can kill me if you like, but at least I'll go to the grave knowing I avenged Marik's death."

Yugi smiled. "You really cared about him?"

"Love conquers all, right?"

Yugi smiled and nodded back at her.

"I'm joking, FYI. I'd advise none of you lot to ever fall in love. Look where it gets you."

Tea shook her head. "No. I can't let it end this way." She shook herself free of Yugi's grasp and ran back to Bakura. "Don't hurt her. Take me instead. I'm the one you wanted. Let her go, and you can have me."

Bakura grinned wickedly, and grabbed Tea's arm. He may have been scrawny, but he was still stronger than both of Tea's arms put together.

"And now I have both of you. But the thing is, I only need one." He looked at Yugi and the rest of the beaten up boys, plus Ryou, who was, shockingly enough, crying on the floor. "Let me put it to you this way, Yugi. Either you deliver the items to me or Tea is dead. And just to prove I'm serious…."

And with one swift, sharp swipe of the deadly serrated blade, it was all over. Blood spattered on the linoleum floor, and Phoebe lay dead on the ground, her throat slashed. Bloodied knife still in hand, Bakura made for the exit, still holding Tea.

"Tonight. 8pm. The cemetery. You had better be there, or else. Oh, and Ryou?"

Ryou looked up from the ground, tears still streaming down his face.

Bakura looked at him.

"Get over it."

And with that, he left the warehouse.

END OF CHAPTER 17

Please review, everyone, it's getting close to the end now. Sorry I didn't warn about the character death, but hey, it's only an OC.


	18. Chapter 18

Disclaimer: I do not own Yu Gi Oh

Chapter 18 – Lies, Lies 

"Well." Said Joey. "That didn't go as well as planned."

"This is ridiculous!" cried Yugi. "Two of our friends dead, and we cant do anything to make sure Tea doesn't die too!"

"That's not true." Countered Duke. "Just give him what he wants this time, and no one will get hurt."

"So what do we even do now?" asked Ryou. "Just wait here until it's time to go to the cemetery?"

"I am not going to a cemetery in the dark." Said Duke flatly. "If I die with my hair looking bad, I swear, I'll come back and haunt you guys."

"Duke!" said Ryou. "Shut up."

Duke did so. They had been sitting on the floor of the warehouse, reflecting on the badness of that day for about five minutes. They contemplating possible solutions to the problem ahead. Well, actually, Duke was combing his hair, Joey was eating a cookie, that, for some inexplicable reason, he had brought with him, Tristan was examining Phoebe's body, and Ryou was crying. Yugi, however, was thinking. There had to be something he could do. There had to be some way he could get Tea back safely without letting Bakura have the millenium items. If that happened, they'd all end up in the shadow realm. Yugi didn't think he was capable of this decision. Save his friend, but risk the fate of the entire world? He was suddenly reminded of Battle City, when he had almost been forced to choose between the welfare of Ryou and defeating Bakura in the first duel of the finals. He hadn't had to make that decision. But he had to make this one.

It was another five minutes gone. No one had spoken. Duke eventually suggested going back to Joey's and having some "fun" before going to the cemetery later that night.

"Fun?" asked Joey incredulously. "Two people are dead, and you want to have fun? What are you on, Duke?"

"Well, it's better than sitting around here moping all day."

"What are we even gonna do tonight?"

"Er, Yugi's going to give that psychopath what he wants, and we're gonna take Tea home safe, that's what gonna happen."

Yugi stood up. "If you'll excuse me, guys, I need to make a call." Yugi left for the back room.

While he was gone, they chatted idly amongst themselves. After about two or three minutes, they suddenly heard a strange sound coming from Ryou's pocket. It seemed to be a cry of: "Lies! Lies!"

"What in God's name is that?" asked Duke.

Ryou frowned. "It's my phone, Duke. I'd have thought you of all people would know what a ringtone is."

"No, I mean, what is that song?"

"It's Arcade Fire, Rebellion. My favourite band?"

Duke rolled his eyes. "I'll take hip hop, any day……"

Ryou answered the phone.

"Hello?"

"Ryou, it's your mother."

"Oh, hi, Mum."

"Ryou, sweetie, maybe I'm a little out of the loop here, but would you mind telling me why there is a dead body in your room?"

"Er……well……OK, don't freak out, mum. I promise, we didn't kill him."

"Oh no? Then who did?"

"Bakura."

"Is he that nice boy you're always playing with at school?"

"Not quite. He looks like me."

"Oh, that boy! Well, trust him."

"We're going after him tonight, mum. Just promise you won't call the police. Otherwise, there's no way we can save Tea."

There was a stony silence on the end of the phone.

"OK, honey, just make sure you're home before ten!"

She hung up.

END OF CHAPTER 18

The next chapter is the final showdown. Oh the anticipation.


	19. Chapter 19

Disclaimer: Don't own Yu Gi Oh 

A/N: Last chapter. Well, last one with any action.

Chapter 19: The Graveyard Rendezvous

Tuesday, 6:00pm

The boys had been back at Joey's house for five hours, but had so far failed to have any fun. They had watched a movie, but none of them enjoyed it. They had played Twister, but Ryou had twisted his ankle. They went to the market to get food, but none of them could eat. They even attempted to watch MTV, but only Duke enjoyed it, and Ryou couldn't stand it.

"What's the point?" he asked. "Why do all these people's rides need to be pimped?"

After an hour or so, they were evidently beginning to get nervous.

"Can we go yet?" asked Joey. "This is boring, and I wanna get a move on, we can't risk being late."

"Joey, the cemetery is 20 minutes drive at the most. We'll be early."

All the same, ten minutes later, they found themselves once more in Duke's car, and set off. The journey wasn't filled with the same nervous anticipation as the journeys to the Game shop and to Ryou's house had, been, but all the same, there was still a kind of tension in the air. The sort of tension of five people who had been through enough excitement together in then past three days to last them a lifetime, and couldn't wait for it all to be over.

They arrived at the cemetery at twenty minutes to eight. It wasn't dark, being that it was June, but it was almost there. Joey mumbled something about hating the dark, and Ryou was already shivering, although it was a mild evening. Tristan and Duke had got back to arguing over serenity, and Yugi was approaching the cemetery gates with an expression of resigned determination.

They opened the creaky gates and proceeded into the dark, dank cemetery. None of the boys were willing to admit it (except Ryou) but they were all by now a little scared.

They trawled across scary cemetery for over ten minutes to no avail. Until they heard noises coming from the mausoleum.

"Guys." Yugi stopped in his tracks. "Do you think that's them?"

They all looked at each other. They knew that whatever happened now would decide Tea's fate. After the whole traumatizing experience, they wanted Tea back safely. Her life lay in the hands of Yugi, but he wasn't giving anything away. His expression was only one of someone who had made up his mind. They entered the mausoleum.

"Bakura!" shouted Yugi. "Return Tea at once!"

Bakura frowned. "Oh, you give me the millenium items first. Hand me the puzzle and necklace and your girlfriend goes free."

"No way." Responded Yugi immediately. "I don't trust you. You give Tea to us first, and then I'll give you the items."

"Oh, and you think I'll trust you? What do I need her for? I'll give her to you as soon as I get what I want. You, however, need those items. How do I know you'll hand them over if I give her to you first?"

Duke looked mad. "What do you mean, how do you know? We're the good guys, remember?"

Bakura narrowed his eyes. "Fine. But if I give her to you, you'll give me the millenium items straight away, or you're all in the Shadow Realm."

Yugi nodded in agreement. "They're yours, Bakura, so long as we get Tea back safely." But in his heart of hearts, he knew it wouldn't be as easy as that. He looked over at Ryou, who seemed to be thinking the same thing.

Ryou gulped to himself. He knew Bakura better than anyone. And he had a bad feeling that once Tea had been returned, and Yugi had given him the millenium items, he would send them all to the Shadow Realm anyway. He glanced at Yugi, and they exchanged a look. Yugi's look seemed to tell Ryou that he had some sort plan, at least.

Bakura released Tea's arm, and shoved her towards Yugi. She hugged him before retiring to the back of the mausoleum to wait with Tristan and Joey.

"Well, what are you waiting for, you fool? I said give me the items. Don't make me regret giving you a chance, little Yugi."

Yugi had an expression of determination on his face. "No." he said quietly.

"What? What do you mean, no? Yugi, you fool, I'll spare your pathetic mortal friends if you hand the items to me! And yet, you refuse!"

"No." said Yugi again, louder this time. His voice was beginning to crack, as though saying this simple word took all the strength he had. "I can't let you have them, Bakura. I know what will happen if you get your hands on them."

Bakura looked incensed. "I knew you'd do this, you insolent little child! Well, I'll just have to take them by force, then, won't I? And then you'll all be taking a permanent vacation in the Shadow Realm!"

"You can't. I won't let you!"

"You won't have a choice!" shouted Bakura. "Don't forget, I can overpower you. I have three millenium items to your two."

"Correction." Said Yugi softly. "You have three millenium items to my four."

"What?"

Yugi was, all of a sudden, bathed in a brilliant white light. Bakura was still trying to register what Yugi had said, but it was too late. Bakura desperately grasped for his millenium items, holding the eye and the rod up to protect himself. But it was no good. Yugi was emitting a glow that came not only from his neck, around which the necklace and puzzle were hanging, but from his pockets, from which he produced in his hands the millenium key and the millenium scales. Bakura nearly choked.

"What? How did you get your hands on those, you little - "

"Oh, I called in a favour. Let's just say I owe Shadi now."

Yugi knew he could finish Bakura. He closed his eyes and thought about the pharaoh, and what he would say if he knew what Yugi had accomplished. The blinding light knocked Bakura off his feet.

After a few seconds, the light coming from the items began to dim. Bakura was lying motionless on the cold, stone floor of the mausoleum. It was over. Ryou ran, teary-eyed, to Bakura and knelt beside his immobile body.

"Bakura….." he stuttered. "Why?"

Yugi went over to Ryou and put an arm around his shoulder. "Ryou, I'm sorry. I can't even imagine losing my Yami."

"Yugi? Is he….in the Shadow Realm?"

"I'm afraid so, Ryou."

Ryou nodded. He and Yugi picked up Bakura and carried him over to a stone hearth in front of an abandoned crypt. They laid his body down.

"Are you going to take the millenium items, Yugi? I mean, now that they're all together."

Yugi shook his head. Without a word, he reached into Bakura's pocket, and took out the millenium eye and the millenium rod. He handed the rod to Ryou. He then walked over to his friends. To Tea, he gave the necklace, to Tristan, the scales, to Duke, the eye, and to Joey, the key.

"Hold on to them. For now. I'm sure Shadi will want them back eventually."

He turned to face Ryou, who was still standing over by Bakura.

"What about the millenium ring, Yugi?"

Yugi smiled. "I think that belongs with Bakura."

Wednesday, 11:00am

Yugi was already awake when his alarm clock rang, but he had been reading. When he heard the buzz of the alarm tell him it was eleven, he got out of bed and opened the curtains to see a bright blue sky and a shining sun. When he went into his backyard to take out the trash, he could feel the freshness and warmth of the air on his face. He couldn't stop smiling. When he went into the front of the shop, he was pleasantly surprised to see his friends waiting there for him.

"Hey Yugi!" they all shouted. "You ready for the movies?"

"The movies?"

"We convinced your grandpa to let you come and see Rabid Hobo Killer with us."

His grandfather nodded.

"After having to scrub "follow your heart, Ryou" off the walls of my shop on Tuesday morning, I convinced these boys to tell me what you five have been doing for the past few days. And I must say, I am very proud of you, Yugi. You faced something so hard I think you can easily cope with a scary movie."

Yugi smiled.

"But before we go," said Tea. "Could I talk to you for a second, Yugi?"

"Sure."

Yugi and Tea went into a corner of the shop.

"I just want to thank you for saving my life, Yugi. That you were willing to put your own life in danger, for me, is just, so…"

"Oh, Tea. You know, it wasn't just me, you know. Everyone had a hand. I never could have saved you I it weren't for everyone else. In fact, I almost feel like I was taking a back seat."

"That's not true. Ryou may have been attached to Bakura, he may have had to go through a lot, and Joey, Tristan, and Duke doubtless helped, but it was you who saved me. I know it was."

"Oh, Tea, I don't really know what to say. I mean, we failed really. Marik and Phoebe are both dead. Two dead good guys and one alive good guy is hardly a winning score. But I'm so glad you're OK. By the way, what was it that Phoebe was doing?"

"Oh, she was brilliant, Yugi. She thought so fast! She went along with it, but later on, in the warehouse, she told me what her plan was. She left that note for you guys, so you could find us, and planned how I could escape once you got there. It's really so unfair. She should be alive right now. I miss her so much."

"I do too. I even miss Marik, a little bit. I know he tried to hurt her, but he didn't deserve to die. Neither of them did."

Wednesday, 3:00pm

Yugi was sitting in his room, reading his book, when suddenly he heard a sound from outside. There was a knock on his bedroom door.

"Come in, grandpa."

"Oh, it's not grandpa."

Yugi grinned. He knew the voice immediately. He ran to the door, and flung it open.

"Yami!" he threw his arms around the pharaoh and hugged him so tight the spiky haired Yami began to choke.

"Er…good to see you too, Yugi."

"Yami, I wasn't expecting you back for another two days! What happened?"

Yami looked shifty. "Oh, the, er, conference finished early."

Yugi grinned wickedly. "Uh huh. So tell me all about it, Yami, was it amazing?"

"It really was. I loved it. It's so nice to explore a new place, get to know new people. So how are things around here? Has anything exciting happened while I've been gone?"

Yugi smiled innocently at his Yami.

"Not really."

THE END.

Well, that's the end of my first ever fanfiction! Did you like it? I guess I gotta start doing some actual work on Death On the Nile now. Oh, and look out for my YGO/Serial Killer crossover, coming soon!


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